I did some book reading and internet research and most places say that babies drop to one nap at 12mo or after... but the some other places say that if the baby is getting 14 total hours of sleep in a 24 hr period they are getting enough (which she is...) - So - I'm not sure what to do from here. Do I adjust her morning nap to be later and go with this one nap thing or do I keep attempting two naps? I want to keep her at two naps, mostly b/c I need the time to work, but forcing it doesn't seem to be working either. Ugh.
The thing that gets me is that she isn't grumpy or anything in the afternoon without it. So I wonder if she would be ok with just one. Ahh parenting....
See? This is the face of a tired baby:
Really... it is! I promise! :)
I would try to gradually move her morning nap up til she is taking one nap in the afternoon. She could go down at one and get up at 3. Just keep her busy while you are putting off the nap and you will have less crabbiness.
ReplyDeleteps you could have her have a quiet time with toys and books in her crib in the morning and see what she does with that.
ReplyDeletehey you could always put her to bed later at night and see if that works.....
ReplyDeleteOh she is still really young to drop down to one nap a day. Julia dropped early, and she was 13.5 months. She did the same thing, though - would take her morning one but refuse the afternoon. But just the morning nap makes for a miserable rest of the day!
ReplyDeleteDuring Julia's transition, I tried to run errands in the morning, so she'd fall asleep in the car for 10-15 minutes. That seemed to help tide her over until the afternoon. Gradually I pushed back that one nap. Probably started it around 11:45 or 12:00, and got it to 1:00 or 1:30 over the course of two weeks or so. And gradually, she stopped falling asleep in the car, but those little catnaps really helped us over the bump. I also needed to put her to bed earlier so her last awake stretch wasn't too long.
But, if I were in this situation, I'd try to ride this out as a temporary thing since she is so young still. I'd shorten the morning nap, even if that means waking her up, and maybe push back the afternoon nap a little so she's still taking two. Maybe that means putting her to bed later and cutting out a bit of nighttime sleep to put it in the naps. At this age, Julia would sleep about 11 hours at night, and then take two 90 minute naps, putting her right at 14 hours. If overall daily sleep is adequate, it's about making her awake stretches tolerable. I've definitely noticed that Julia will push around her sleep times but still get the same # of hours in a day total. But I've also noticed I have some control over it. She has a tendency to let her naps get too long so her night sleep is too short, and after a few days of waking her "early" from her naps, her night sleep lengthens again and her naps shorten up.
Then again, you have to work with what you're given. If Lia's really trying to drop her nap, you can't make everyone miserable by forcing it. I'd give it an honest shot at riding it out. You know how quickly they go in and out of phases. But if it's just not working for y'all, it's not working for y'all. She certainly wouldn't be the earliest baby to ever drop down to one nap.