toddlers are ridiculously difficult

I play an ISBI, so I don't have any control over the toddlers. Even so, my controlled Sim can usually manage them quite easily. I do keep some fruit or carrots in their inventory, though, for emergencies. And I admit, if my toddler's hunger is in the red, I will break the rule about managing only one Sim to make them eat something. I think it's actually easier to just have one Sim doing the caretaking than to try and make every Sim in the household deal with the little one.

"HowGreatThouArt;c-16827964" wrote:
-No high chair.
-Make group meals and drag them to the toddler's room when the toddler is hungry.
-Get Movement and Potty to at least 2.
-Put a nightlight above their bed to cut back on nightmares.
-Stock the toddler's room with a tablet (which they never tire of) and toys.

If you do those things, toddlers are pretty self-sufficient. Giving them the Independent trait also makes them less socially needy. I love this stage so I hope those tips help you enjoy them too :smile:

Exactly this, all of this.

"PastelMermaid;c-16828145" wrote:

"MVWdeZT;c-16828116" wrote:
I play an ISBI, so I don't have any control over the toddlers. Even so, my controlled Sim can usually manage them quite easily. I do keep some fruit or carrots in their inventory, though, for emergencies. And I admit, if my toddler's hunger is in the red, I will break the rule about managing only one Sim to make them eat something. I think it's actually easier to just have one Sim doing the caretaking than to try and make every Sim in the household deal with the little one.

ISBI?

“I’m surrounded by idiots” it means you can only control one sim.

I think, as in RL, it's all a matter of being organized. Work on the toddler's skills, the thinking one in particular, as this will help them to throw fewer tantrums. I often have two or more toddlers in a family at the same time (not twins or triplets, either, just varying ages). I do use the MCCC mod which I use to help the teens/YAs and Adult Sims ahead of the game needs-wise, so that they don't starve to death or suffer humiliation by peeing their pants whilst attending their little toddler darlings.

Take a deep breath :) (and let it out slowly) and view this life stage as the challenge it is. It's a challenge in RL, too. But so worth it in the end. ;) And I'm here if you need to vent.

"HowGreatThouArt;c-16827964" wrote:
-No high chair.
-Make group meals and drag them to the toddler's room when the toddler is hungry.
-Get Movement and Potty to at least 2.
-Put a nightlight above their bed to cut back on nightmares.
-Stock the toddler's room with a tablet (which they never tire of) and toys.

If you do those things, toddlers are pretty self-sufficient. Giving them the Independent trait also makes them less socially needy. I love this stage so I hope those tips help you enjoy them too :smile:

I agree with all of this. I actually enjoy the toddler life stage, even though sometimes they do things that annoy me. But typically that’s because of the trait that I’ve given them. I usually don’t bother with high chairs, which were a huge source of my toddler frustration. There’s the constant knocking food on the floor, or another sim interfering and pulling them out of the high chair before they’ve eaten just because the toddler asked them to. ?

I work on leveling up the potty and skill quickly. If my sims live in a multi-level home, I place a potty on both floors so the toddler can easily access them without spending time going up or down stairs. For my households with twins, I had either live-in nanny or butlers I created (for my wealthy families) take care of them during the day. They’d help them level up in their skills quicker. This also gave the parents time to complete the after work activities they needed to do to get promoted in their careers.

Paying attention to their needs is really important because they can become impossible to deal with if they are hungry or sleepy. I keep meals available for toddlers so I can drag the food to wherever they are if they are on the verge of a meltdown. I try my best to make sure their needs don’t go into the red.

After having raised at least 30 toddlers between my three saves (i am doing a baby challenge right now), I have found a lot of things that make raising toddlers easier, a lot of which has already been said (drag the food, yes they can go to the fridge to get it but it is faster to drag it close to them, work on thinking skill first to get less defiance). I have also come to the conclusion that for me personally, getting all their skills to level 3 makes more sense than going for the "Five Star Toddler" (all skills at level 5), as getting them from 3 to 5 seems to take a lot longer than getting them to 3, and all it does is start their child skill level at level 2 instead of level 1, and child skills are so easy to build anyway (especially at first), I have found that taking all the extra time to move from 3 to 5 as toddlers just doesn't make sense.

Also good advice that has been said, getting a routine and being organized. I have a single mom who has anywhere from one to three toddlers at any given time, and what I do is since the toddlers have to sleep a lot longer than the adults, is I get up the mom and sort all of her needs out first (having the nice bed and the steel bladder trait helps a lot). Then when the toddlers get up they usually eat breakfast right away, then on to potty training and baths (if they need, if you're getting them to the potty most of the time their hygiene level doesn't go down too fast). When they reach level 2 potty they can go on their own but it does take longer for their potty skill to build this way.

As for the other skills, the tablets as has been mentioned, they love and never tire of, but it builds their skills slower than if they are doing something. For Thinking skill shapes on the blocks gets that up fastest, especially if parent or older siblings "teach" them, and especially if they have the clingy trait. Even doing the shapes on their own gets it up faster than SimShape. But they do tire of the blocks eventually so look out for that.

For movement, there are lots of options to get that up fast, there's of course just having them wander or move from place to place when you have time for that, but they can also stack with the blocks (which again builds even faster if someone is teaching it to them), or using the toddler slide or ball pit. The blocks and play equipment also ups their fun levels too so I prefer doing it this way.

For imagination, they can play at the doll house or "pretend" on the toddler play equipment, or look at (or be read) a toddler book, and these will increase imagination faster than Draw with Llama.

For Communication skill, I've found the very fastest way to increase that is using the large stuffed animals to babble, hug, and talk to them. There's also teach to talk, which builds it faster, but they can get a negative moodlet for this if you do it too long.

It also helps to have a routine to get them ready for bed. Usually I will start with someone potty training them, then feed them meal / making sure their hunger is full, then someone (mom or dad if he is visiting, or teen sibling) reading them to sleep. This does usually take two to three sim hours at least for the whole routine so you do have to plan accordingly. If you have the night light above the bed and someone reads them to sleep / tucks them in, it does prevent them from getting nightmares. I have found it is important for all their other motives to be full at night before putting them to bed because they sleep so long that if you don't, they'll wake up hungry or needing to potty.

It is extra work in the beginning and end of the day, but it is totally doable and really not that hard once you get a routine going.

Also despite them taking some work, focus, and organization on my part, I just love the toddlers because they are SO adorable and always look forward to the day where the baby can age up to a toddler ?

"Rebbilina;c-16827838" wrote:
They can be a challenge, but I find that getting the family and the toddler into some sort of daily routine helps. Also; if they don’t nap during the day, they will get really cranky, kind of like a real life toddlers.

As for skills, levelling up potty skill makes them be able to use the potty on their own rather than rely on someone changing their diaper. A higher thinking skill makes them less defiant and makes them not have nightmares as often.

It might also be the traits. I find that fussy, wild and clingy toddlers are the hardest to deal with and I will usually not have those traits if I have another toddler in the household.

I wish there was a Put Down for Nap option, where the caregiver can put them to bed without changing them into nightwear. Though I don't want them napping too late in the day so they go to bed relatively early (usually by about 7 or 8pm).

I find Sims 4 toddlers much easier than Sims 2 or 3 toddlers. I think they skew a little bit older so they can do more on their own as they gain skills: as they gain Movement they can climb stairs, and they can grab food from a counter so you don't have to go get them a bottle. I make sure to have the main cook in the family get the Fresh Chef trait so that food never spoils, so I can leave a plate of mac n' cheese or a loaf of bread out on the counter at all times for them to grab when they're hungry. I'll even leave a plate of bagels or a loaf of cheesy bread in the toddler's bedroom for quick snacks. And twins can actually play together and babble at each other, so Commnication builds extra fast. Children can do more for toddlers as well; when one of my toddlers woke up with a nightmare, instead of waking up her parents she went into her brother's room and he was able to comfort her and get her back to bed. I'm using that as part of the game play and they'll remain close.

Favorite toddler traits are Silly (they tend to make more messes but otherwise are adorable), Angelic, Charmer, Independent and Inquisitive. I don't play the other traits much though I did have a Clingy toddler and she wasn't too bad; I do like that Clingy toddlers learn faster when a Sim helps them.

I wish they would fix the highchairs. Id love to be able to use them. But they definitely make playing with toddlers a nightmare

"Kniga_Sitara;c-16827805" wrote:
No, toddlers are easy, very easy. Non problémy with toddlers!

im not convinced we're talking about the same game then

They are hard to play if you want to maximize their skills.