After a bad night with Jasper at 2 weeks of age a midwife gave us a DVD explaining the tweddle technique. The tweddle technique is basically looking out for tired signs & putting the baby to bed awake so he can settle himself to sleep. The key is to follow the same routine every time.

I started to recognize Jaspers’ tired signs which were; losing eye contact, redness around the eyes, clenched fights, he would stiffen out his arms & legs and he became wriggly. As soon as we saw one of these signs we would change his nappy, read him his “bedtime” book, put him into bed awake, turn his mobile on & leave the room closing the door. Amazingly he would then drop off to sleep on his own. Wow!

95 percent of the time that is all we have to do. On the rare occasions where he cries, I will follow the same process however after a few minutes of crying I will re-enter the room, pat him a few times, say goodnight, turn the mobile on again & leave the room. I never pick him up. I prefer to settle him in his cot. If it doesn’t work on the second go, then I will open the blind which distracts him from crying, put his covers back on, close the blinds again, turn his mobile on again & leave the room.    

I read on the raising children network website that if you attend to their cries immediately, they will actually cry less. We tested this theory & when we let him cry he got too stressed & it was VERY hard to settle him again. By going into him after just a few cries it reassures him that we are there & he will drop off to sleep immediately. This has worked for us.  

I think we are the luckiest parents in the world. Jasper loves his sleep which makes putting him to bed easy. Let’s hope it lasts!