Allow me to paint a picture for you: It’s 4:15am. You are asleep. Everyone is asleep. You hear shuffling. Your door creaks open {okay, so maybe your door doesn’t creak. Lucky!} A small person begins inundating you with requests at full, normal conversational volume: “Pancakes please Mom;” “Hi Dad;” “I want to read Hop on Pop;” “I want to play Memory!” Everyone is no longer asleep: you sigh and hope the clock is wrong; the baby awakens, excited to converse with her sister; husband groans and mutters things you hope toddler does not repeat. Chaos ensues.  Thank goodness she can’t yet reach the light switch.

Until two weeks ago, the above story {nightmare?} was a recurrent early morning occurrence. Our career 12-hour-per-night sleeper transitioned all of a sudden into an early riser. It started with a move from 7:30am to 6:30.. then 6… 5… {it got uglier}.. and then 4am. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to deduce that this behavior was disruptive to the sleep of the rest of the family. Some {great} friends and I were discussing this business of early rising a few weeks ago, and I was somewhat relieved to hear that it is seemingly common. So common, in fact, that companies market special clocks to serve as a sort of toddler alarm clock: they have areas that light up with a moon and stars when it is time for sleep, and a sun when it is time to be awake and can also eventually be used to teach children how to read a clock. Some have games.. music.. the ability to record your own messages.. The principle is great, and I came awfully close to clicking “buy now,” but something was nagging me. As my house slowly but surely is transformed into a small toy store, I realized that we have already accumulated at least three time-telling puzzles, games, et cetera. Cue the brainstorming: the purpose of these toddler alarm clocks is a visual cue that it is time to get up. What else could serve that purpose? As it turned out, the answer cost less than $10 and was already sitting in my utility cabinet. What, pray tell, was this miraculous alternative?

An Indoor Appliance Timer

Greetings from a land of increased sleep for all! Over the past week we have {somewhat intensely} implemented some sleep behavior modifications and yielded some pretty excellent results.

I simply hooked up her bedroom lamp to an indoor appliance timer and placed the lamp out of her reach. It is set to turn on at 7am. We explained that if she wakes up and the light is off, she should stay in bed until the light comes on. If she wakes up and the light is on, she can come out of her room. We discussed this for a full day, quizzing her repeatedly on what she should do.

It seemed too easy to actually work, but miraculously, it did. And then it worked again. And over and over again. I actually held off sharing this idea to ensure that our success wasn’t a one-hit wonder, but I am happy to report that I am writing to you from a more well-rested point of view. Sometimes we hear her squeal with excitement when her light comes on and she can come out of her room, but more often than not she puts herself back to sleep and the soft lamp light turning on is not enough to wake her up when it switches on. I realize this may not be a golden ticket for everyone, but surely something to trial before committing to something more expensive!

Tip: If your child has been getting up at 5:30am, you probably won’t have success jumping that alarm clock straight to 7am. Try incremental changes (15 or 30 minutes) as their patience in “waiting for the light to come on” will not extend for two hours.

Sweet dreams!