Sorry, I was thinking you had posted something about them going to bed sometime after 9 and then waking up at sunrise, even though you had a light cover over their cage, so I'm was thinking something like 5 - 7 am. As for a night light, you just need a little light in the room and then leave a little gap in the cover at the bottom to let the light in. Just enough light so that they can see their way around, but not enough for them to think it's daytime. It really is that simple.

The sunrise is about at 7.30 and it was even later some time ago.
Our schedule was due to parent birds feeding babies, and 12 hour night seemed like a large night interval, especially if one parent is doing his feeding job not so well for some reasons.

IS everybody always home for the birds every evening to put them to sleep at 7 or 8? I take my kiddo to her classes some evenings every week, plus sometimes we have events like a theater play, etc... Tomorrow, for example, she has a choir concert at 7pm, we all will be there. I don't have anybody else to ask to take care of the birds. I will probably have to leave the concert early, and the family will tell that I put pets ahead of the children (sigh, sigh)

good you don't have to worry about being home at a certain time to put them to sleep, and not to worry you are being late because some other chores are tearing you apart

I try to put my birds to bed at 9 pm and wake them up at 11 am.

wow I can't believe they agree to sleep and don't mind being covered when half of the day basically over! Mine do better under the new covers but they still wake up and start eating after 8am.

If they're still waking up before you uncover them, it may not be dark enough or quiet enough (or both). As for them sleeping half or over half the day, that's what they would be doing in the wild during winter... when it's non-breeding time. That's why fewer daylight hours make them want to breed, because that's when it's summer time and food and food gathering time is plentiful. I'ts natural for them to sleep for 12-14 hours for at least up to 6 months of the year in the wild.

Aso, personally, I wouldn't put my pets above my kiddo. Compromises, sure, but I wouldn't miss out on a recital or something just because I need to put the birds to bed... I figure out an alternative, like putting them to bed earlier or having them sleep in later the next day or if it's just a one off, I just let them have a late night and a regular wake up time. Your daughter is already not getting clean clothes in the morning, don't miss her concert just to put the birds to bed, come on. You need to find a solution where you can keep your birds from breeding nonstop and still be able to live your life.

I never said I was going to miss the concert. Daughter performed at the beginning, so I was going to miss some older kids. We always used to watch a whole thing. But I made it til the end as It was not very late. Unfortunately, some other things are getting affected as well when evening family events pop up. I didn't handfeed the babies. Couldn't do it earlier and it was too late when I came home.

I think the only thing that would help me with the light would be replacing the blinds, so its not that simple. Its already very dark in cages at night with the covers I am using. As for the noise, they are in the living room, and we.... you know... live in the living room Nobody makes any extreme noises, everybody knows not to make noise because the birds are sleeping, but it's just not possible to isolate all sounds. There is no doors between the living room and the kitchen, and I am absolutely not able to finish everything before their bedtime. Actually, they kicked us out of the living room long ago. I used to be reading on my laptop sitting on the couch at night - not anymore.
When we had Chipper and Trillie, and Cuddles wasn't here, before all the eggs and babies, we used to take them to the basement for the night. But it always seemed to me that it's cold down there. Plus its not easy to have enough cages for upstairs and downstairs when you have as many birds as we have now. Their cages are upstairs and they are big. In the bedrooms upstairs they would have to wake up with our alarm clock, that goes off several times for different people at different time. The reason they are in the living room - I want to naturally be around them as much as possible, and usually I don;t spend much time in the bedrooms during the day.

We have the same issue here with the cages in the living room, which is why I move them to the back rooms for bedtime. They come out to the living room for awake time. Is this not possible for you as well?

It would be probably possible if we had a backroom
What kind of backrooms do you have? I only have 2 bedrooms upstairs, and lots of space downstairs.
Do you roll cages there?