7 night-time hacks every parent needs up their sleeve

Every parent knows the importance of being prepared when you have kids – day or night. In fact, especially at night!

Once they're out of nappies, avoid nighttime loo spillages by lighting the way to the loo AND the toilet bowl with LED lights.

They don't cost a lot and will make it easier for kids to find the loo plus mean less cleaning up of near misses for you the next morning.

You're welcome!

You can buy toilet bowl lights that have motion sensors for around £13 – see more details here at Amazon.

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There's nothing worse than being woken in the night by a child vomiting on the carpet / the bed / the whole room .

Once it's happened to you once, you'll never be caught unprepared again. Parents whose kids have puked learn to keep a handy sick or general clean-up bucket in bedrooms or somewhere handy upstairs.

Essentials: plastic gloves, cloth, anti-bac, a roll of kitchen roll all in a decent size bowl or bucket.

Until kids are able to sleep through the night without wetting the bed, a handy trick is to double up your bedding when you change the sheets.

So starting with a mattress protector or plastic sheet, next put on your fitted sheet, then another plastic bed sheet and then a second fitted sheet over the top. Then, if they wet the bed in the middle of the night you can just grab the top layers and voila, a dry sheet awaits in seconds.

No one wants to start hunting for bedding and making up beds from scratch at 3am, believe us.

Even if you're not at that stage yet, there's nothing like a clean sleepy baby all ready for bed ... and then up comes their milk, everywhere.

They're tired, you're tired, so always have a second sleeping bag ready to change them into after that inevitable post-feed puke.

And the double layer trick above also works well for cot sheets, too!

To avoid or nip nightmares at some unearthly hour in the bud, try a worry monster toy.

If you can find one with a zip-open mouth all the better. That way, when they have a nightmare you write down what's in the dream and put it in the monster's mouth. Just remember to sneak it out in the morning to show the nightmare has been 'eaten up' and won't come back again!

A nightmare-free night 'should' take place the next night. And even if it doesn't, at least you've got a quick-ish way for them to get back to sleep ...

Amazon has a great range of Worry Monster toys – see more details here.

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Having a bottle of Calpol (or other age-appropriate medicine) with a syringe ready, hidden in their room (out of reach), is a parenting 101. Even better, keep a thermometer handy in their room, too.

It's one less thing to worry about if they do wake up with a temperature in the night. Just make sure your other half also knows where it is, so they don't wake you up looking for it!

The same goes for eczema cream or Sudocrem if they wake up itchy and 'can't sleep. At least you can soothe in seconds if you don't have to hunt downstairs for the right cream.

And let's be honest, Sudocrem fixes EVERYTHING!

Avoid needlessly being woken up because kids are afraid of the dark by getting nightlights for their bedrooms.

That way, they can turn them on themselves to feel reassured rather than waking you up, too.

The same goes for your other half, too. If you need an early night but your partner loves to read, clip-on reading lights are a relationship saviour. You can doze off without being blinded by a light ... just in time to get woken up by a baby/child crying 'Mummmm' no doubt.

We love this cute penguin nightlight by Tommee Tippee – perfect for small hands to carry on night-time bathroom visits – see more details at Amazon.

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