Here is how we do our's:
Our 6 year old gets all of the toothbrushes ready and he brushes his teeth first. Then the two little ones brush their's next. We find splitting this up helps with less fighting.
Once everyone's teeth are brushed and their pajamas are on we move to the bedroom. Right now all three of our kids sleep in the same room. It is a big room. I don't usually read them a story at bedtime because I'm pretty tired by this point and my husband isn't always here to tag team with me at bedtime.
I have to tuck them in. Then I pray with each one of them. My older son is very specific with me that I pray that he does not have any bad dreams. Next I pray with my daughter. She doesn't really have any specific requests. My little man just says, "Thank you, Mommy." when I am done praying with him.
Once the prayers are done, the singing commences. The ONE SONG I must sing every.single.night is "I Love You Lord". I cannot leave the room without singing it. The other songs are up in the air. Sometimes it is "How much is that doggie in the window", sometimes it is "Little Ducky Duddle" and on an occasion it is "Yippee ki yi yay get along little doggie" - seriously I'm not kidding.
And before I leave we must go over what the happenings are for the next day. It goes something like this. What are we going to do tomorrow? Then I tell them and then they say, "And then what?" until I go through each item until bedtime.
Thus ends the routine. Always the same, always precious, sometimes exhausting, but always thankful that we have that time together.
How about you? What special things do you do in your bedtime routines?
I agree, I especially love the singing part. You mean they don't request "Granny's in the Cellar"? I can hardly believe it! Haha!
ReplyDeleteHannah goes to bed before Katie, but we all get into our pajamas as the same time and brush our teeth. Then I go up and read with Hannah and then we do our 3 kisses: a tiny peck, a big fat squishy-lip kiss and a butterfly kiss. Then I'll go downstairs and read with Katie until her bedtime and then we do the 3 kisses also. :)
We love bedtime routine also and it has evolved over the years. Brush teeth, jammies on, we also have all the kids in one big room. They get into bed and we each tell about our favorite part of the day, from youngest to oldest. Then we pray from oldest to youngest. Mr. Berns reads a chapter of Proverbs, then a chapter of Psalms. If kids are still awake, we read something else - biography, Chronicles of Narnia, The Book of Virtues. If we are really tired, we start a podcast of our favorite preachers - Dr. Charles Stanley, Andy Stanley, John MacArthur, etc. The kids go to sleep hearing someone talk to them.
ReplyDeleteIt is a rather lengthy process - most of the time an hour or more. We like to be in the beds at 9pm and hopefully asleep at 10pm. It works the very best when I get a nap during the day because I can only do so much!
Thanks for sharing about this, Gretchen. We LOVE the bedtime routine.
Christian has a phrase he uses it's "hugkissgoodnightpray" all stuck together as if it's one word. Sometimes he forgets I already "hugkissedgoodnightprayed" with him, if I'm taking too long with the others, so I have to do it all over again. No amount of me telling him I already "huggkissgoodnightprayed" will convince him, so it's easier just to do it again! Lately, I've just been doing his bedtime stuff after Isaac & Jeremiah, so he doesn't have time to forget! The older 2 have a different routine. Wish I could put them all to bed at the same time, but 12 year olds have a problem w/7:30 bedtimes. I don't know why!
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed reading this. I too prayed for "No bad dreams" for longer than I care to admit!! :) What do you do about endless (attempts at stalling) questions at bedtime? Scott has gotten very good at this, and I feel torn. He likes to ask spiritual questions as I'm tucking him in. I love to be able to talk with him about such things, but he will fire off one question after another to keep me from leaving the room...making our bedtime routine take a long time.
ReplyDelete@klutzymama
ReplyDeleteHa, no Granny's in the Cellar sung here. Isaac would probably like it though.
@Lynn Berns
ReplyDeleteWow, that is a long bedtime routing. I don't have the energy for that now but maybe as the kids do get older we will expand it.
@Sarah
ReplyDeleteI do remember that once we reached a certain age we did get to stay up half an hour longer than the "smaller" ones. It is a thing to look forward to for the older kids.
@Lindsey
ReplyDeleteI don't get spiritual questions, but if I do get other questions I say we will talk about it in the morning and I usually leave the room as they are still talking to me and I am usually saying, "Okay, good night. Go to sleep love you." Caleb talks for at least 15-20 minutes after I leave the room but he doesn't get up so I just let him talk.