What does your toddlers day look like?

[Grace's Mom]

What do you do if she trys to interupt you at couch time?

For room time do you put up a gate?
DD is highly spirited and I wonder if she'll do it with out a gate 

I LOVE your ideas.
Melissa

[DebLillian]

Wow.  I love the independent room time... DD is so touchy I can't imagine her doing that.  How did you get there?

[mummy_bec]

Wow, I love the independent room time - must try it with my toddler!

[TERESA-E&C's Mommy]

As everyone else... how did you work up to room time?

[Grace's Mom]

We tried couch time yesterday.
All things considered...1st time trying it + highly spirited toddler we got 4 minutes to talk 
Not bad
baby steps, right 

[TERESA-E&C's Mommy]

Did Grace actually stay out of the room for 4 minutes?  That is wonderful!!!!

[Grace's Mom]

No, she was in the living room with us, just played by herself.
At first she kept talking to us, but we continued to say "this is mommy and daddy time...you can talk to us when the timer goes off"...we use timers a lot to help her understand time, etc.
Towards the end she either got the idea, or got tired of us telling her the same thing LOL

[irish3680]

Haha about Grace and couch time! Nice job! Ella also plays in the living room with us during couch time or sometimes she plays on our enclosed porch trying shoes on  If Ella tries to interupt us, we just quickly remind her that it is important for Mom and Dad to give each other our undivided attention and she is a big girl who can play by herself for a while, then we turn to each other and continue our conversation. AT first she protested, but now I think she is comforted by and likes seeing us show love to each other.

For the record, Ella is very spirited also  and it took a while to work up to room time and even now we still have some rough days with it. We started doing blanket time around a year old where I would spread a big blanket out on the floor and put some toys on it for Ella to play with. The blanket was her boundary and she was not to leave it. It took about a week of this daily with lots of putting her back on the blanket before she got the idea and started following the rules during this time. I think this helped pave the way to room time. Initially when we started room time I did put a gate up at her door. She HATED this, so I decided to see how she would do with no physical boundary at the door. She likes it much better and stays in her room for the most part. The other day she walked out of her room after 10 minutes and yelled downstairs, "Mama room time all done". I just guided her back to her room and told her she was not to come out again and she listened. She is still in a crib and some days she asks to have her room time in her bed, so on those days I know she can't go anywhere  I do tell her if she repeatedly leaves her room during independent playtime, I will put the gate back up on her door. This has been enough to keep her in her room after an initial warning.

Good luck if anyone decides to implement these times during their days. It does take some work to get it started, but it has been SO worth it for us for numerous reasons!

[elliesmama]

wow!  i just read the room time and couch time ideas and I love them both!   Going to try it for sure!  My husband and I work at home, and many times we have meetings here so we've been beginning to teach Ellie about "Adult talking time."  She can be in the room, but she cannot interrupt.  I feel a little disorganized in the way I'm teaching her  because it doesn't happen every day, but last time she responded to it fine--mainly beause i told everybody there to ignore her if she tried to get their attention--but after a couple minutes, she just went and played by herself.  I also try to be sensitive to her small attention span and try to limit the adult time to a short time. 

Anyway, I think the room time and the couch time is GREAT and I think it will help us for many reasons.

[DebLillian]

Ok, I think we have finally successfully gotten on the new routine.  Here it is in great detail including potty times (she is almost entirely trained... we started with Tracey's suggestion at 9mo), meals & all.  She is now 19 mo:

5:30/6:00am wake, potty, snuggle, breakfast (cereal, milk & fruit)
8am juice, potty
8:30 potty
9am snack (crackers or something of the sort)
9:30 potty & outing.  5-10 min cat nap in car on mornings that started earlier
10:30 potty (usually out somewhere)
11/11:30 lunch (protein, grain, veggie, fruit & water)
11:45/12:15 potty & nap for 1.25-2hrs
1:30 wake, potty (usually BM) & milk
3pm potty, snack (from the group she ate the least of at lunch... protein or veggie usually)
potty as needed in PM- usually can hold it longer
5/5:30pm dinner (protein, grain, veggie & water)
7pm bath, books
7:30 lullaby & lights out

[saylorblue]

DD is 32mos and has been a BW baby since she was 8w old.

6/6:30a Wake
6:45a B'fast
9:30a Snack
12p Lunch
1:30p Nap (plays a bit but if she's going to nap, she's typically out in 30 minutes)
2-4/4:30 Nap
5p Snack
6p Dinner
7 Bath, Books, PJs
7:30 Bed

DS is 12mos old:

6:30a Wake/BF
6:45a B'fast
8:30-10:30 Nap
10:45 BF
12 Lunch
1:15/1:45-3:30/4 Nap
4 BF/Snack
6 Dinner
7 Bath, Books, PJs
7:30 Bed**

** I am thinking I need to tweak this. It's causing him to be a bear in that final hour. I want to try to put DS down before DD - but it's a tricky thing as they share a room and I'm afraid DD will wake DS as she doesn't always stay in her bed when we leave the room (she's in a toddler bed).

[becky1969]

I'm not sure if I've posted our latest routine, and am too lazy to go back thru the posts. So forgive me if I repeat!

Owen is now 33 months old, and we moved to this routine at around 28 months.  Basically, his nap moved from 1 pm to 2 pm, and his bedtime went from 7:30 to 8 or 8:30.  this means I now get very late wakings, which I love!  I thought he'd wake at 7:30 am for the rest of my natural life! 

8:30/9 am wake
9:30/10 breakfast

10-12 classes, playdates, or errands.

12:30 lunch

1:30 go upstairs for wind down, stories

2 pm asleep
4 pm wake up (although, lately we've been getting some 2.5-3 hour naps)

6 pm dinner

7:45 wind down

8:15 in bed, and usually asleep soon after


I truly love this new routine.  The late mornings are nice, and going to bed at 8:15 means we have some time after dinner to play as a family instead of rushing to get jammies and cleaned up etc.  I was very surprised to figure out that he needed so little A time after nap!  In fact, tonight he didn't wake up until 4:45 pm, and was asleep by 9 pm, which is only 4.25!  Works for me!

[MeAndVee]

Vinyak is 13 months and has been on the same routine for months now.

6-6:30 wake up

8 breakfast {usually oatmeal}

10 9oz bottle

12 lunch {PB&J or ceam cheese and jam sandwhich}

1-3 nap

3 snack {yogurt, applesauce, or banana}

6 dinner {rice, yogurt, veg, and dhal}

7 bedtime routine

7:30 9oz bottle

7:40 bed, asleep by 8

Working on eliminating the two bottles but as he refuses to take milk from a sippy we are stuck at the moment.  He eats pretty much the same things everyday, not into variety but we try.

[katemom]

Kate will be 2 in a few weeks, and here is her schedule:

Sometime between 6:15-7:15 Awake
8:00 Breakfast
Lunch is somewhere between 11:30 and 12:30,
Goes in crib sometime between 12:00 and 1:00
Sleep for 1.5-3 hours usually, awake no later than 3:00
Dinner is somewhere between 6-6:30
Bedtime routine starts at 7:15
In bed between 7:30-7:45
Asleep no later than 8:00

She's not potty trained yet - she has a 4 month old brother, so we postponed that project for a bit...

katemom

[emandtom]

hi this is mine and thomas routine.
thomas up at 7ish has 6 oz of cows milk warmed
9am back to sleep until 10am
10am breakfast and lots of it!
1pm sleep until half 2 ish
2.30pm lunch yum yum
5.30 pm tea time
6.45 8 oz of formula with two rusks in it (very nice)
7pm straight to nan night x

thomas is one years old and he has been on the same wake to nap patters/times since he was 5 months old !! easy does it !!!!!!!!!