Lil Tip: Dream Jar

December 5, 2008

If you've got a wee one who wakes up paralyzed with fright at night, end his nightmares with pleasant thoughts before bed. A Sugar staffer who had trouble sleeping when she was lil, told me about her then teenage sister's remedy — a dream jar. It was filled with pink and blue papers with all kinds of adventures written on them from "Tonight you will ride on a unicorn" to "You're going to Disneyland with your family." Each evening she had the child choose one before she fell asleep and it worked. The nightmares were willed away.

11 Comments

MartiniLush 4 years 24 weeks

Wow, great idea! I am going to try this with my son!

weirdy 4 years 24 weeks

That is a great idea which i'll definitely keep in mind when i have a kid.. Thanks

erniew 4 years 24 weeks

A great idea that I might even implement for my husband and I. What dreams do we have that we can talk about as we fall asleep??

tweet hotpants 4 years 24 weeks

what an amazingly sweet sister!! that's a fantastic idea.

Greggie 4 years 24 weeks

Our problem wasn't waking, it was him being scared to go to sleep. We did something similar, where we wished a dream upon him. To be honest, it didn't work, but he also has OCD and nothing we suggest is going to change his mindset. Eventually we just put the boys in the same room and they both ended up doing better.

eatingcookies 4 years 24 weeks

That is so sweet! I like that a lot; my boy is almost a year so this is a little beyond him yet, but I will use this some day!

cheersdarlin916 4 years 24 weeks

When my son was little I had a regular nightlite in his room but at around 3-4 years old he started getting scared at night so I went out and bought one of those indigo nightlites and told him that it was a special light that chased away bad dreams and monsters and it totally worked and even now that he is 12 he still likes it on, you know, just in case.