Sample Toddler Schedule (and How to Get Them into a Schedule)

Importance of routines for toddlers (and babies too)

When I got pregnant, I told myself that I would just be a chill mom. I would tell myself that “I won’t sweat it”, “I’ll just go with the flow”. That was until I gave birth and found that there was no “flow” whatsoever in how my husband and I were doing things. Everything was so random. Our bed time would sometimes be at 6 pm, some nights at 8 pm and some nights as late as 12 midnight. Some days our baby would spend the whole day sleeping but would be up all night. The randomness began to take a toll on our bodies, mental health and emotional well-being, especially when the time came for us to both go back to work. It was just crazy!

The randomness began to take a toll on our bodies, mental health and emotional well-being.

Fortunately, I started reading up online and discovered the importance of establishing routines for babies and toddlers. As Healthline put it, “Children crave consistency. Right from birth, they’ll feel safer, more secure and reassured if they understand the pattern of – when this happens, then this happens”. This totally made sense to me! As adults, we sometimes get anxious and scared because we do not know what will happen next, what more babies who experience everything for the first time?

When we started to establish daily routines and patterns, we started getting our groove. We finally had a “flow”. Everybody in the household, especially our baby, became calmer and I finally felt that I could actually be a chill mom. Our baby is now a toddler at almost 2 years old and here’s how our daily schedule or routine currently looks like.

Sample toddler schedule – 2 year old, one nap schedule

The below times are just estimates. We don’t really obsess over the exact times but we focus more on the routine and the patterns. This ensures that even if there are disruptions such as traveling or attending an event, we don’t panic and go crazy about following a rigid time based schedule.

sample toddler schedule, toddler schedule chart, daily schedule for toddlers printable — Toddler Schedule Chart

How to get your baby or toddler into a routine or schedule

At first, the idea of getting my baby into a schedule stressed me out since I can get a bit obsessive compulsive at times. But what really helped was to not obsess about getting the times exactly right but rather on just establishing a routine. It became simpler when I started to think of the routine like a simple cycle such as the one below. This was something that I learned after consulting with a sleep consultant, Himbing, and after reading some articles from Taking Cara Babies, both of which were recommended to me by fellow moms.

Looking back, I realize that the key to establishing a routine starts with sleep. When we sleep trained our son and he started to have a solid night’s sleep, everything just fell into place. After sleeping for 12 hours straight, our son would wake up fully recharged and ready for the day. He started to take just the right amount of naps during the day and during wake times, he was up and alert, ready to play and bond with his mama and papa.

Now you might be asking, how do I get my baby or toddler to have a full night’s sleep? For us, having a solid and consistent bed time routine and a safe place conducive for sleeping really helped.

Our Bedtime Routine and Sleep Environment

#1 Lots of love, hugs, kisses and attention

Our bed time routine starts with us just hanging out with our son on our bed. This is when we cuddle, talk about our day and read books. Our son’s bedtime book favorites include Goodnight Moon and Slumberkins Presents Slumber Sloth. After hanging out, we give him some milk and brush his teeth.

Slumberkins Presents Slumber Sloth — Image from amazon.com

#2 Safe room conducive for sleep

We then bring him to his room which is already prepped for a good night’s sleep. We make sure to keep his room dark with dim lights from a lamp and some black out curtains. According to our sleep consultant, Himbing, it’s important to keep the room dark to “bore them to sleep”. Lights can stimulate the baby and make it harder for them to sleep.

For our baby’s crib, we chose the Nuna Sena Aire. Since we knew that we loved to travel, we needed a crib that was compact and easy to pack to take anywhere. As first time parents, we were of course paranoid to leave him alone in his room. So we invested on what we (as well as TIME Magazine who named it as one of the best inventions of 2018) think is the best baby monitor, the Nanit Pro Camera. We absolutely love this! We could watch our baby sleep from anywhere. When I had to go back to the office and I missed my baby, I would conveniently open the Nanit app on my phone and just watch him sleep. My husband and I also loved the data and insights that the Nanit recorded. It allowed us to see what time our son usually wakes up or how much time it took for him to fall asleep after we put him in his crib. This allowed us to easily adjust our routines and our own schedules.

Once we get to his room, we first turn on the sound machine. The sound machine doesn’t need to be fancy. You really just need to have some white noise. We live in a small space so it was important for us to drown out any noise from the other rooms. Next, since we live in a tropical country and it’s hot all year round, we turn on the air conditioner to make sure that the temperature in his room is at around 70 degrees Farenheit. For deep sleep, Healthline and WebMD actually recommend around 60 to 65 degrees Farenheit. But for us, after some trial and error, we settled for 70 degrees Farenheit.

#3 Comfy clothes

By this time, he is already in his onesies and pajamas coming from his bath earlier, so we just put on some socks. Our go to place for onesies is Carter’s and PatPat for socks since they have bundles and multipacks that provide really great value for money. They also last long despite having to wash them again and again and they remain soft and comfy for our son.

Carter's onesies multipacks — Image from carters.com

When our son was still a baby, we didn’t use pajamas and socks. After putting him in his onesies, we put him in his Love to Dream swaddle — another multi-awarded baby item (and rightfully so). He absolutely loved this since it allowed him to sleep so comfortably with his arms up. My husband and I loved it too since it was so easy for us to get him out and back in during those middle of the night diaper changes.

#4 More hugs and kisses!

After making sure that our son is comfy in his sleep attire, we hug each other and sing Twinkle Twinkle Little Star. As we put him in his crib, we kiss him, say good night and thank him for being such a good boy the whole day. We then turn off the lamp, leave his room and open the Nanit app on our iPad to watch him fall asleep.

Getting into a routine is very important as both kids and adults thrive with familiarity and consistency, which in turn provides security and calmness. At first, the idea of getting into a routine stressed me out but once we established our daily routine, I transformed into the chill mom that I ultimately wanted to be. If you’re still at a loss on where to start, start with sleep! Like most of us, having a good night’s sleep makes our day a thousand times better.