How to create the perfect "baby cave" for sleep

Creating a cozy “baby cave” can do wonders for your family’s sleep - both overnight and during naps. Follow these tips to ensure your child’s sleep environment is optimal:

Temperature 

The ideal temperature in your baby’s room is between 68-72 degrees.  Temperature is important for two reasons.  First, a cool room allows for your baby’s body to cool down faster and encourages a deeper sleep throughout the night.  Additionally, a cooler room helps to reduce risk factors for SIDS that are related to overheating. In fact, using a ceiling fan to circulate the air and cool your baby’s room has been linked to decreased risk for SIDS by 72%.  

So how can you tell if your baby is too cool or too warm for sleep?  Well first, your baby should never feel hot to the touch.  If you feel your baby's chest or forehead and it is hot, clammy or sweaty, then it’s best to remove a layer of clothing or lower the room temperature.  Your baby’s hands should be cool to the touch. A light cotton pajama and sleep sack or swaddle should be sufficient - and some babies need even less to be comfortable. Make sure you aren’t over-bundling in the colder months.

Darkness 

The optimal sleep environment is very dark. Making your baby’s room as dark as possible is just one of the many ways that you can help your baby’s brain to settle into deeper sleep patterns and to stay there longer.  Even blackout shades may not darken the bedroom enough – an extra layer is often needed to ensure the room is dark enough to create an environment conducive to daytime napping and sleeping later than sunrise. 

Exposure to light is the single greatest influence over our circadian rhythms. For this reason, keeping the bedroom dark until it is an acceptable time to wake up in the morning is key. For example, regularly allowing the lights to be on at 5:00 a.m. will reset your baby’s internal clock to wake at that time. At nap time, a dark room is important for blocking out stimulation. If there is a night-light in the room, ensure that it is a very dim one and that it is motion activated.

Myth: You can train a child to sleep in a light room. Nope. Not true at all. Get black out curtains. It is so worth it.

 Blue lights (the default lighting of LEDs) interfere with melatonin production and should be avoided in the bedroom if possible. There are LEDs Using a red bulb has shown to be less disruptive for sleep - and actually protects the production of melatonin in your little one’s body as opposed to a regular night light. If you use a light projector or light-up toy in your baby’s sleep space, make sure that it isn’t too bright, too stimulating, or potentially interfering with melatonin production.

Continuous white noise

White noise serves many purposes. For younger babies, it helps to recreate the same sounds and soothing environment of the womb.  For older babies, toddlers and children, using white noise is an easy step you can take to protect their sleep by drowning out potential house noises, older children, street disruptions (like garbage trucks, sirens, or leaf blowers) - and even overstimulation. 

Myth: You can train a child to sleep in a noisy environment. Nope. Busted! White noise is your friend and some babies are very sensitive to noises, no matter how much exposure they have.

Room Choice

The room in which your child sleeps also impacts how well (or poorly) they sleep throughout both nights and naps.  The AAP recommends that babies share a room with their parents until they are at least 6 months. This is because it has been shown to reduce the risk factors for SIDS, so I do recommend following the guidance. Unfortunately, babies who room share tend to wake more frequently. In order to decrease this likelihood, there are several steps you can take. 1) Ensure that your room also has white noise and black-out blinds. 2) If you are nursing, your baby is more likely to wake frequently if they are right beside your bed. This is because they can smell your milk and are more prone to wake for comfort feedings. In my experience with families, I’ve found that moving the baby to the other side of the bed (or at least several feet away can help ease this).  

Additionally, some babies - especially as they get older and become more aware of their surroundings - will wake frequently as long as anyone is in the room with them.  They are roused by you rolling over in your own bed, snoring, etc. Again, moving them away from your bedside can help with this. Many babies also benefit from having a partition (out of their reach) between themselves and their parents.  This allows you to continue to room share well past 6 months, but also limits disrupted sleep that is attributable to the noises and disruptions caused by having other people in the room.

Start “baby cave” An hour before bedtime 

Keeping the lights dim and activities calm and quiet before bedtime will help your baby ease into the bedtime routine. With toddlers and bigger kids, you could build a fort and read by flashlight, pretending like you’re camping.

The blue lights emitted from TV screens and other back lit devices can interfere with melatonin production. To be safe, avoid all screens in the hour or two preceding bedtime. Doing so will help to avoid overstimulation as well. 

Is your child’s room too bright and you need a quick fix? Here’s a before and after of my 4 year old’s black out shade reinforcement:

See all the summertime light coming through the shade and around the edges (top left photo)? It’s fine in December when days are like 5 hours long, but the shade is nowhere near sufficient around the summer solstice. This photo was taken at bedtime.

After hanging a sweet Carolina Panther’s fleece blanket, the baby cave was sufficiently darkened and ready for sleep. All you need is a hammer, two nails, two clips (although the blanket pictured below stays up without clips), and a blanket or towels. I think the steps are pretty self explanatory from the photos below.