When to establish a bedtime routine?

[Ellsbells]

I have an 8 week old little boy who on the general is ok at night. He sleeps in our bedroom in his moses basket and I make it as cosy as I can for him in there. We take him up to bed with us at around 10.00pm/10.30pm, feed him and put him down and he's pretty much sleep any time until 1.30/3 and then he's fed, put down and wakes again around 4/6 and wants a feed and then wants to stay awake! So on the general he goes about 3 hours between feeds!

As I'm a FTM, I was just wondering when it's a good idea to try and encourage a bedtime routine, I think this is really important to establish from an early age! I just don't know whether there is any harm in doing it TOO early?

I'm getting some baby monitors for Christmas (as they were something I didn't think I needed at first, oh how wrong I was!) so I was hoping to start bathing him, feeding him and putting him down for the night at around 7pm, in our bedroom with all the lights off and having a monitor downstairs with us? I'm hoping this will shortly cut out his night feeds?

Any ideas or advice would be great!

 

[YorksLass]

I only have the one 6mo, so can only talk from experience of her, but we used to do the same, taking her to bed (in her moses basket) when we went up around 11ish. She started to find her own schedule eventually - i forget when exactly, possibly around 3 months, she was regularly falling asleep at 9, so i'd put her down upstairs with monitors on and we'd have a bit of evening to ourselves before going up I'd definitely started a sort of bedtime routine by then if not before then, perhaps two and a half months - massage, bath, feed and some rocking and singing to get her off to sleep.
Gradually she started wanting to sleep earlier and earlier - from about 4 to 4.5 months she's been down by 7, latest 8, but she seems to sleep better throughout the night the earlier she goes. Still wakes for night feeds, occasionally sleeps through, but tends to want to get up at 6:30 every morning!
Plenty of good daytime naps help too, although these got easier to regulate times in the last 2 months - one morning nap around 9, a longer lunchtime nap and another around 4 (or sometimes 3 and 5 for a short time, depending). For an 8 week old i think naps are all over the place though! We have playtime after last nap, plenty naked exercise on towels (tummy time's good for that at 2 months) which leads into winding down with massage, bath, feed, book, say goodnight to dad and the dog, then upstairs for singing and bed while still awake but sleepy. She's not bad at getting herself off to sleep now! She's been in her own room in a cot since 5 months also, which has helped her sleeping, without us waking her.
Realised that's a lot of information, hope any of that helps at all! I think the crux of what i'm saying is that you'll figure it out - you'll start noticing when they're tending to want to sleep and what works best when. Never too early to start experimenting with routines

 

[kumber]

They tend to fall into their own routine. I've never bath, bottle/boob, bed cus daily bathing is actually quite damaging to skin

 

[YorksLass]

(Bath/top n' tail hon )

 

[kumber]

Top n' tail was sooooooooo much easier wasn't it! Still got my little bowl from the boys, I can't seem to part with it and still use it now - they're 16 months and 2.5yrs

 

[YorksLass]

Oh god, so much easier... does my back in holding a baby up in the bath, unless I bathe with her (which she loves!)