Let's Talk About Naps
Little Bean Cat Napping.
Now that Little Bean is 2 and half months we are getting in a groove with bed time. He still fusses a bit but goes down on his own in the crib. Last night I even got a run in afterwards! It’s was so nice. I am truly a fan of bed times. 
Now that I have some kind of handle on the nighttime routine I’m moving to naps.
Right now–as in this very moment–he just sleeps on and off. Normally napping within an hour of waking in the morning. Then he’s up to eat, smiles at me a few times and doses off again. I’ve been considering putting him down in the crib but I’m not sure if these little cat naps are worth it. Yet I feel at least one good solid nap a day is healthy for him. No?
When did your little ones start to nap in their cribs, if ever? I remember my first having 2 good naps a day for awhile and then shifting to 1 but for the life of me I can’t remember WHEN that started.
Any and all nap insights welcomed.
Understanding Baby Cries: What those tears really mean
we started putting deck down for naps, in the crib, around 2-months so he would get used to it… then a week before i went back to work, we moved him into there full-time and he’s done well ever since… he’s in daycare so he takes a nap in the AM and a nap in the PM, but i’m sure that will change… as for weekends – he’s all over the place because we are bit more lax, but we really try and get him down for at least 1, regardless of how much he cries… not sure if that helped, but i think the sooner you get him used to being in the crib and at the same time everyday – he’ll catch-on eventually…
My daughter didn’t have a crib until she was almost 6 months old… she co-slept with me at night (no, for all the haters, I don’t want to hear about the “no co-sleeping, my doctor/neighbor/midwife/sister’s cousin’s friend said – ” she’s 7 now and obviously fine) but during the day, she went into the bassinet for a lay down every 2-3 hours. If she wasn’t in the mood to sleep and still up 15 minutes later, I’d bring her back out. Eventually, by the time she was 3 months old, we had a pretty good sleeping schedule down in which she took 90 minute naps at 10-ish, 2ish, and 5ish, with a bedtime (for me and her) of about 9:30-10pm
My little guy was a 30 minute napper forEVER. On.the.dot. It wasn’t until he got to about 7 mths that he started extending it and just now that he’s 9 mths that he’s consolidating into 2 naps a day. Up until then it was 30 minutes every 1-2 hrs. That said, he wasn’t a good night time sleeper until around 8 mths. I think it’s FANTASTIC that you can place him in the crib to go to sleep at night. I think that’s pretty rare – lucky, but rare!
Mine did 2 naps a day (9 AM and 1 PM –roughly) until they were about 15 months old, then we went to 1 nap a day…my 3 year old still naps every afternoon.
As far as when they started that?? I am not sure. I remember putting them in their cribs every time though from early on. I want to say it was around 3 months old that they really started getting into the nap routine. And mine always were awake for an hour in the morning and then back down. So if he woke at 7, he would nap again around 8 or so.
All babies are different. I had one good sleeper (two naps a day, transitioning to 1 etc.) but my youngest just didn’t like to nap, even as a really little baby, he’d only sleep 20 – 30 minutes at a time. He wouldn’t even fall asleep for car rides. It never seemed to affect him negatively, he wasn’t any more fussy than you’d expect, I guess he just needed less sleep than other babies. He did sleep better at night than my older one. He’s 18, and even now it’s a pretty big deal at our house if he sleeps in past 10 am. When I was his age, I could easily sleep til noon or 1:00!
“On Becoming Babywise,: by Gary Ezzo, is a little intense, but a great philosophy from which you can flex. The suggested nap schedule and technique gave me all the confidence that my baby would fall asleep without any fuss, especially if I wasn’t the one putting the child down.
My four kids all transitioned from baby wearing naps to crib naps around 4 mos. Two naps a day roughy 8:30 or 9 and 12:30 or 1 (and 1.5 to 2 hours each). At about 14 or so months they transitioned to one nap a day that lasted about 2-2.5 hours. That was true for all my kids but I was definitely more apt to enforce a nap routine after my first and second child. My baby is 8 mo, and there are almost 11 years between her and the next up, so I was back to being a little lax on naps since I’m frequently driving kids here and there but now I try pretty hard to make sure we are home during those times. The right amount of sleep I think is essential for development and an overall happy mood
Roni,
Its like you were reading my mind with this post! We are trying to figure this out too. I will let you know what works….this week is still trial and error!
Good Luck,
Robyn
Lynn said: “My daughter didn’t have a crib until she was almost 6 months old… she co-slept with me at night”
Hey Lynn, my boys both co-slept with us exclusively too! We actually did it for way longer than 6 months… they never had cribs. Moved the oldest to a bed when he was about 18 months, and the younger one at about 12 months (Mr Independent, that one). These days the youngest sleeps in his bed all night, and the older one still enjoys coming to our bed sometime throughout the night.
For Roni, it sounds like you’re ready to get him into a daytime napping routine in the crib, and so I suggest going for it. It’s all about Mama’s happiness when it comes down to it: “Mama ain’t happy, ain’t noboby happy.”
At such a young age, babies need a good 3 solid naps at a minimum of an hour each a day. Every age has different sleep requirements that are made up through nighttime and nap time sleep. The Sleep Easy Solution is an AMAZING book that I would highly recommend, it saved both of my children’s sleep habits! It will tell you everything you need to know about your child’s sleep from age 0-5. Go to http://www.sleepyplanet.com/ for the book, info about the authors, and amazing sleep advice!!!
I would highly recommend healthy sleep happy child. The book is amazing. It changed my life. Now my one year old sleeps 12 hours at night and takes two naps every day. The book will help you get his nap schedule down almost immediately. I am buying this book from now on for anyone who is having a baby. You all already doing everything he suggests at night. I think you’d like his style:-) good luck!
Remember babies sleep, eat, pee, and poop for the first few months, and they sleep longer, and require more sleep when they have growth spurts. Eventually the morning nap will go away as he gets older but i believe it was 6-8 months that it was 1 nap a day.
Ditto the HealthY Sleep Habits, Healthy Child book. It does have some great ideas on what typical sleep patterns are for certain ages, and how to help your children sleep their best (It even will talk about Ryan’s age!).
I have three daughters, the youngest is 3 weeks, and all nap in their cribs. It seems like it was at about 3 months that their naps shifted to a long morning nap and long afternoon nap, rather can kind of off and on all day.
He is beautiful!!
We couldn’t really get Maya on a good napping schedule til she was 11 weeks old — now she generally has one good morning nap and either one long afternoon nap or two small afternoon naps. It’s hard … but definitely worth it!!
Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child & On Becoming Babywise are so helpful that I started right out confident in the sleep department. Because of these books, we did crib naps almost immediately for many naptimes, and my kids also took 4-6 little naps (30 minutes to 1 1/2 hours) until they started eating less often, maybe at about 5 months. After that it was 2 big naps a day, and then one big nap a day (3-4 hours) at about 18 months. The Babywise pattern is eat, wake, sleep, and since nursing babies eat about 7 times during the day, I think that works out to 6 potential naps. I had two out of three happy babies with this pattern, and my colicky baby at least had excellent sleep patterns following this routine. I can’t imagine how hard it would have been with her had I not done this routine because it’s supposed to be a very calming way to eat for irritable tummies.