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Personalised Bedtime Stories: Using a Book About Your Child to Calm Evenings Down

How a bedtime story starring your child can make the end of the day easier: a simple routine, which tales are calm enough for bedtime, and when narration helps.

By I Am In The Story Blog Editorial Team · Updated · 2 min read
Sleeping Beauty personalised story book – illustrated page 2

Key takeaways

  • A predictable routine in the same order every night does most of the work.
  • A story they want is a useful carrot: teeth first, then your book.
  • For bedtime, pick calm tales with no villain or a gentle one, and save the pirates for daytime.
  • Screens are best dimmed or avoided in the last hour; a printed copy helps.

Bedtime goes wrong in predictable places: getting out of the bath, teeth, the negotiation over “one more”. A personalised book won’t fix a child who isn’t tired, but it is a very effective carrot, and a story in which they’re safe and brave is a good last thing to think about before sleep.

The routine matters more than the book

Most of the calming comes from doing the same things in the same order every night. The book is one step in it.

  1. The same bedtime, give or take, every night.
  2. Bath or wash, pyjamas, teeth, in the same order.
  3. Main light off, a lamp on.
  4. They choose between two books. (The personalised one will win most nights. That’s fine.)
  5. Read it slowly, and a little quieter as you go.
  6. One question, “what was your favourite bit?”, then lights out.

On bad nights

Read one page rather than skipping the story. Keeping the ritual matters more than finishing the book.

A story subscription: a new book with them in it at the hour you choose.

Which tales are calm enough

Some of the twenty tales are better at 7pm than others. Pirates, giants and a Mouse King are daytime reading. For bedtime we’d go with:

The Unicorn and the Rainbow has no villain at all. The hero helps a shy unicorn find its colours by doing small kind things: lifting a branch off a rabbit, freeing a fox cub from the reeds, putting a bird back in its nest. It ends with the two of them sitting in the meadow grass watching the rainbow, which is about as calm as a last page gets.

Goldilocks has the soothing rhythm of threes and ends with an apology and a friendship.

Sleeping Beauty is, fittingly, about a whole palace falling asleep, and in this version the child is the one who wakes it gently back up.

The Little Match Girl, retold here without the sad ending, is a quiet winter story about warmth and a grandmother’s kindness.

Peter Pan is the exception worth mentioning: it’s an adventure, but it starts and ends in a bedroom at night, so it works well for children who need a bit more excitement before they’ll settle.

Every page read aloud while the pages turn, in the language of the book.

When you can’t be there

  • A grandparent or babysitter can read it; the child will correct them if they skip a word.
  • A parent away for work can read it on a video call.
  • The finished book can be listened to, read aloud page by page.

Screens at bedtime

A digital book is ideal for holidays and for reading with a grandparent over video. Right before sleep, many families prefer a printed copy, or at least a dimmed screen. We weigh the two up in digital vs printed.

If you want to try a bedtime book, The Unicorn and the Rainbow in the watercolour look is a good place to start. The research on why children fixate on books about themselves is in this article.

Frequently asked questions

What's a good bedtime story for a 3-year-old?

Something short, familiar and calm, such as Goldilocks or The Unicorn and the Rainbow. Repetition at bedtime is soothing rather than boring.

Can a personalised book be read aloud automatically?

On I Am In The Story you can listen to the finished book read aloud, which helps when a parent is away or a grandparent wants to share it.

Are screens a problem at bedtime?

Many sleep specialists suggest avoiding bright screens in the hour before sleep. If you read a digital book, turn the brightness right down, or read a printed copy instead.

Pick a fairy tale, add your child

Classic stories children already know by name — each one retold with your child on every page.

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