Moms of 2, bedtime stories?

ally-cat

How do you handle this.  We want to include Millie in the bedtime story routine, but not sure how.

Do one of you (assuming there are two of you) read to one child and the other parent read to the other?  Or do you combine?  I know Max is on a different level than Millie, and he just loves, I mean LOVES books.  So I don't want to take that special time away from him.

I was thinking of maybe doing a joint story for the both of them (Millie will go to sleep way quicker than Max, he's always asking for more books) and then do a couple books for Max while one of us puts Millie asleep.

 

tracigator

The way we do it is that one of us gets Benjamin ready for bed and the other gets Noah ready.  After they are all ready, we all go into Noah's room and read books to Noah.  Once we finish reading to N and say goodnight to him, DH and I go into B's room and read books to B by himself.  We've done it this way since Noah was about Millie's age. 

Benjamin loves the routine of reading with his brother but he also loves getting his own special time with books just for him. It also gives him a variety.  He still loves all of the picture books but we've also started reading him chapter books which he has been loving too so he gets the best of both worlds.

Daisy22

Once Bryce started taking baths with Bailey we did it together which was when Bryce was 6mths old. Before that we read to them separately during their separate bedtime routines. We do a preschool devotional at night before bed. Right now we read to Preston separately until he gets old enough to stay up as late as the big ones. 

slwprincess

I really wanted to combine bedtime, but we just never could make it work.  They never really went to bed at the same time until just the last few months and whenever we have tried to combine, it seemed to send one or the other into a tailspin.  So we pretty much split up the bedtime duties.  DH usually handles Sophie- he sings her all the special songs that his grandpa used to sing to him.  Its so sweet.  I handle Gavin- he usually picks a short kids book and then I read a few pages out of a chapter book (ok, fine... it's Harry Potter :-)  This works really well for us except one issue... if DH is out of town, Sophie does NOT approve of me singing to her!  I don't know his songs and she gets agitated and usually ends up CIO.  So my advice if you go that route is to switch it up enough that the kids don't make a bedtime association with one particular person.

Daisygirl613

Up until the last 2 weeks, each of us would put one kid to bed and we would read separately. 

Then one day Cooper ran into Jax's room and climbed in bed beside him and listened to the story with Jax.

So now we let them lay together and read the story - which is whatever library book jax has for the week. then take Cooper back in his room to rock and sleep.

lowkeybride2be

Our baby isn't due until December, so we haven't really dealt with this yet. My husband and I are trying to split up as much as possible for bedtime now just to prepare our older son (he's just a bit older than yours). It's easier said than done, though. He's used to having both of us together for bedtime.

Here's an idea for you (and one which we'll try): Why not let your older son read a book to the baby? Reading stories (based on memory, of course) is a great skill for three year-olds (just read Nurtureshock). It could also make the older child feel very involved and important in his younger sibling's bedtime routine. We're definitely going to try this.