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Many toddlers wake up before it’s truly time to start the day, or before their wake up light turns green. When that happens, parents often wonder:
Should I let my child quietly play with toys until it’s time to get up?
And is it okay to let kids bring toys into bed at bedtime or nap time?

At first glance, both of these solutions can feel harmless or even like a parenting win. But in reality, they can sometimes create habits that make sleep more difficult.

In this episode, Allison answers these two common questions and explains why protecting the sleep environment matters more than many parents realize.

You’ll learn why toys can make it harder for children to fall asleep efficiently, how early morning play can reinforce early wakings, and what boundaries help toddlers and preschoolers get the sleep they need.

Allison also shares realistic alternatives, including when comfort items and loveys are perfectly fine and how wake up lights can still work well with the right structure.

If your toddler or preschooler struggles with bedtime stalling or early morning wakings, this episode will help you create a sleep environment that supports rest instead of competing with it.

Looking for expert guidance on your child’s sleep? Allison offers two free age-specific guides to help you discover how much sleep kids need to thrive—at any age. Get your free copy now: 0-2 Years Old or 3 to 10 years old

From baby sleep to toddler sleep, daycare naps to sleep training—How Long ’Til Bedtime? is the podcast for parents who want practical, guilt-free sleep tips they can actually use.

Hosted by pediatric sleep coach Allison Egidi, each episode delivers real solutions for every stage—from navigating newborn sleep struggles and weaning night feedings to helping your 3-year-old fall asleep independently (and stay asleep!). Whether you’re trying to make sense of daycare sleep patterns, craving your evenings back, or simply need a working mom podcast to keep you grounded, you’re in the right place.

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Scroll down for a full transcript of this episode.

232. Toddler Sleep Boundaries: Toys in Bed and Early Morning Play
Allison Egidi: Before we dive in, can we just take a moment to talk about coming out of the winter blues? Spring and fall are my two favorite seasons and winter is by far my least favorite, even though I do like having four seasons. When I lived in Chicago for seven years, I really struggled not only with the cold temperatures, but also the lack of winter sun there. Moving back to Virginia was a total game changer in the sunshine department. And our winners here are just so much shorter. But by the time February rolls around each year, I am still pretty over it. As I record this episode in early March, it is a bright sunny day that’s going to be in the 70s. I walked my dogs this morning wearing just a sweater and noticed the spring flowers popping up and I almost immediately could feel the difference. I felt more relaxed, more optimistic, just generally lighter. I absolutely love the transition into spring. And if you feel the same way, I hope spring has sprung wherever you are and that you’re getting outside each morning to take in that morning sun. Never underestimate the power of a little sunshine. Okay, on to today’s episode.

Today I’m answering a question that has been coming up quite a bit lately from parents of toddlers and preschoolers. Should you let your child bring toys into their crib or bed? And is it okay to let a child who wakes up early play quietly in their room until it’s time to get up and leave their room for the day?

Hey there, Alison here. Welcome back to How Long ‘Til Bedtime. Okay, picture this. Your child wakes up before their wake up light turns green. Instead of calling for you, they quietly grab some toys and start playing in their room. Most parents think that sounds like a huge win, but it can actually create a slippery slope when it comes to sleep.

So today I want to answer two related questions that I’ve been hearing a lot lately. First, should kids bring toys into their bed or crib at bedtime or during nap time? And second, if a child wakes up earlier than we want them to be up for the day, should we let them play with toys quietly in their room until their light turns green? My general recommendation for both of these is no, but hang with me because I want to explain why.

All right, part one, toys in the bed. Let’s start with the whole idea of toys in the bed because a lot of kids ask about it. One of the things we want to protect when it comes to sleep is falling asleep efficiently. Ideally, when a child gets into bed, they’re able to settle and fall asleep within five to 15 minutes, 20 minutes max. But when toys enter the picture, bedtime can easily turn into playtime instead of sleep time. Toys are interesting. They can be stimulating. They invite imagination and engagement and they can make it much harder for child’s brain and body to shift down into sleep mode. I sometimes compare this to what happens when adults bring their phones into the bed.

You climb in the bed planning to go to bed and go to sleep, but then you start scrolling. And before you know it, 30 minutes have passed. Toys can have a similar effect for kids. Instead of settling down, they may stay mentally engaged. And when falling asleep gets delayed, it can result in kids missing their ideal bedtime window, which can sometimes lead to night wakings or early morning wakeups because they fell asleep out of alignment with their ideal natural sleep rhythm.

There’s also a practical issue if children bring hard toys into their bed things like trucks, figurines, or other plastic toys they can actually wake themselves up during the night. mean imagine trying to sleep with a toy truck jammed into your back. If you roll over onto one of these things, it’s probably going to wake you up and you’re not going to be too happy about it because it wasn’t even a natural waking. And so that’s what can happen with our kids. So not only can toys delay them falling asleep initially, they can sometimes cause unnecessary night wakings as well.

What I am okay with is one to three soft, let’s call them comfort items. A lot of people call them lovies. So think things like a favorite stuffed animal, some form of a soft lovie or a small blanket if your child has a little blanket they like. And it’s okay if your child is engaging with these lovies a little bit, but they aren’t very stimulating.

The key difference is that those are put in there with the intent of having them be a soothing item, not an entertainment or stimulating item. We want that sleep environment to feel calm and quiet, not like a playroom.

Okay, let’s talk about the second question. What about letting kids play with toys if they wake up before their wake up light turns green?

This usually comes up when parents are using something like a Hatch or another okay to wake clock and they want their child to stay in their room until a certain time, let’s say 6:30 or 7. So they say something like, if you wake up before your light turns green, you can quietly play with toys in your room until you see the light turn green. And initially this might work fine. Maybe your child is waking up around 6 and you want them to stay in their room until 6:30. Playing quietly for 20 to 30 minutes doesn’t seem like a big deal if you thought they had gotten enough sleep. But where this can become tricky is when children eventually have a day where they wake up much earlier. Maybe instead of waking at 6, they will get up at 5:00 or 5:15.

And remember, just like for you or me, the early morning window between four and six a.m. is actually one of the harder times for kids to fall back to sleep because the pull to sleep is coming down. That pressure to sleep is hitting its lowest point. And if they wake up and the thought process is I could try to roll over and go back to sleep or I could just get up and play with my toy, most kids are going to choose getting up and playing with their toys. And once that becomes the habit, those too early wakeups can start to stick or even creep earlier and earlier because they’re suddenly out of rhythm. And this can leave you with a child who is not getting enough total sleep and ends up overtired. Even if they’re technically following the rule of staying in their room until 6:30, I sometimes compare this to what happens when you or I wake up early and we grab our dang phones. If we don’t grab our phone at 5 AM, there’s a decent chance we might drift back to sleep. But once we grab our phone and start scrolling, the chances of falling back to sleep drop dramatically. Toys can have that same effect for kids, they’re very tempting. They’re very tempting, just like our phones are tempting for us.

This is just one of those moments where it helps to remember that structure and boundaries are part of our job as parents. We are not trying to be mean. We’re trying to create an environment that sets our kids up for success. So ideally, before the wake up light turns green, the expectation is simply it is still time to be quietly resting or sleeping until your light is green. Your child can rest, they can cuddle with their lovey or they can just relax in bed if they’re not able to fall asleep. And if they’re up early and haven’t actually gotten enough sleep, many children will drift back to sleep if you hold that structure and maintain that calm environment in their bedroom.

Now there is one caveat. Some children are naturally rule followers and you know if you have one of these. I, as in many areas of parenting have one of both. So I know what it’s like to have a rule follower and one who is a little more impulsive and a bit of a limit tester. So if you have a rule follower and you’re using a wake up light like the Hatch, you could try two light settings. For example, the light could turn yellow at 6:30 in the morning, which signals that they can get out of bed and quietly play in their room. And then it could turn green at 7 a.m., which means they can leave their room and start their day.

But this is really a situation where you need to know your child. Some kids will follow that rule perfectly. Others will assume, well, I’m up, the light’s not yellow, but I assume my parents are sleeping, so I’m just going to go ahead and start playing now. And the other thing I want to note, if you are feeling pretty confident, that you have a rule follower is that it’s really important that you set that yellow light to turn on at a time that really allows your child to get adequate sleep. Don’t let it creep too early because they may be following the rule, but you may be cutting into their sleep.

Now, before I wrap up, let’s do a little troubleshooting.

If your child becomes someone who’s having a really hard time resisting their toys in the morning, it may help to actually remove the toys from their room. And the way you present this matters. Instead of framing it as a punishment, I want you to frame it as help. You might say something like, Hey, I see you’re having a really hard time remembering that we don’t play with our toys before the light turns green. And I get it. If I had all those awesome toys in my room, it would probably be really tempting for me to get up early and play with them too.

But then you’re not getting enough sleep. So I’m going to help you by moving the toys into the family room for a little while. And they’re not going to go away forever. We’re just going to take a break from having them in your room. So it’s easier for your body to rest.

Typically if it comes to this and you have to remove toys, I usually say keep them out for 7 to 14 days, get things back to a good place, and then you can slowly start to bring the toys back in and see if your child is able to resist the urge and to follow the rules of the sleep light. If things go well, fantastic, you can keep the toys in your child’s room.

But if your child is still struggling, the reality might be that you can’t keep very exciting toys in their room because they just haven’t developed that impulse control just yet. The big idea here is simple. Protect your child’s sleep space. The bedroom should support sleep, not compete with it.

As always, thanks for listening to How Long ‘Til Bedtime, and I will see you back here next week. Bye for now.