Wake Time for 7-8 month olds

My babies are still only going 1.5 to 2 hours in between naps. We're on 3 naps a day. I've tried having them go 3 hours and it backfired and they took horrible naps the rest of the day. I feel like we can't go anywhere because we always have to be ready for the next naptime. When will they be able to go longer? The other problem is that sometimes DS will nap for only 30-45 min. and DD will nap for 1.5 hrs. Then it really messes things up and we can't go anywhere. I don't feel like it's fair to wake DD from a 1.5 hr. nap just to keep them on the same schedule. It's not like that's a long nap or anything. In this situation, what would you do?


Here is their approximate schedule:

6:30 am Wake up
8:15-9:15 am Nap #1
11:15 am - 12:15 pm Nap #2
2:30-3:15 pm - Nap #3
6:00 or 6:30 pm - Bedtime

They are usually melting down by 5:30 pm or so because they don't nap very well. I would love to drop the 3rd nap so we'd have a solid block of time in the late afternoon, but we are not even close to that happening. The good news is that they are finally sleeping better at night, thanks to CIO.

 

My girls still can't go more than an 1.5/2 hours between naps, but they have dropped the third one, so it makes life a little easier. Have you tried letting DS CIO when he wakes up after 45 minutes? Sometimes, one of my DDs will wake at the 30-45 minute mark and I just let them fuss for 10 minutes and they are back to sleep and will sleep for about 2 hours. This makes the day so much better. I wouldn't wake DD up, because one cranky baby is better than two! lol I would try to get DS to sleep a bit longer. It sounds like he isn't getting enough sleep during the day.

My girls start to meltdown at around 5/5:30 too, but I think they know that bedtime is around the corner and are still getting used to not taking that third nap.

 

If you let him fuss & cry for a bit will Logan go back to sleep after the 30-45 minute nap? If one woke early from a nap, I never woke the other, either, thinking one asleep is better than none, right?

I think we started 2 naps a day at around 9 months and when we did, it was the second nap that went, not the third. So, they were still napping in the morning, then they had lunch & were up for a good chunk of time & went back down for an afternoon nap. Otherwise, the late afternoons & early evenings were a mess!

 

Mine used to have to go down at 5:30 pm for the same reason. If someone was here to help me then we could usually keep them up later, but when I was by myself it got so overwhelming that lots of nights they were in bed for 5:30 and were up every morning at 5:30 am. They started to sleep later after the first year. Once they started sleeping in later I started putting them to bed later.

I think we went to 2 naps around 9 months old.

 

I completely know your frustration!! I couldnt wait until my LO's dropped that nap so we could go out and do things. However when they did it was hard, they had to go to bed at 6pm or they were miserable! The other thing that happened was they were waking at 5am for a bottle. It took a good month or so to adjust. Good news.....now at 10.5 they are sleeping straight through until 6:30.

I say if they are STTN a solid 12 hours, LEAVE IT!! They will eventually out grow that third nap. I tried getting mine to go until 7pm and it didnt matter, they still woke up at 6-6:30. My DD was a short napper too, but has gotten better. We still have bad days! Ive learned to just let it go, tommorrow is a new day!

I wonder if my two will ever sleep good on the same day!!!

GL!!

 

Their sleep cycles are around 45 mins and at the end they get into a real light sleep b/f they go into the next cycle. My son did this all the time and still does when his naps get messed up. I would just wait and look at the clock and at around 45 minutes he would wake right up I would go right in and soothe him to sleep. If I didn't go right in he would then wake up for real and wouldn't go back to sleep. He is a difficult sleeper his name is logan too, must be the name j/k. since you are doing CIO I would stay consistent and let him cry and he will probably fall back asleep. My son would just cry then start playing so if I do not go in there he won't go back to sleep and then at that point my other son would be up and they would both be ready for a diaper change and feed. Once he learned to take an hour and half nap (two sleep cycles) he dropped the third nap. They are 8 months now and we do 2 hours awake, nap, 2 hours awake, nap and then 4 hour max later which ever comes first 7pm or the 4 hours they have been up for is when I put them to sleep. Having that 4 hour block in the aftertoon is nice and we can take some short trips in the middle of feedings and getting ready for bed. However, I don't think I will see a big difference until they drop till 1 nap after a year and do the 12-2 nap that most babies do. Then going out should be much easier. I give my one son 15 mins to get back to sleep I just pat his back and no eye contact and make sure he keeps his head and feet down. if he doesn't fall asleep and is too much in the awake mode I wake my other son the good sleeper and then at that point he has been sleeping for about an hour and it keeps them on the same schedule. It doesn't really affect my other son since he is a good sleeper and just goes with the flow, but now I never wake Logan he gets too thrown off if his naps are messed with. If Keegan wakes up for some reason I just look at the clock to see if Logan has made it into the next sleep cycle and go in there and snuggle with Keegan. In the begining I would rock Logan after the 45 or sleep with him and did whatever to get him into the next sleep cycle and into the habbit of taking a nap past the 45 mins once I realized it was a sleep cycle problem (that is what they recommend in the No Cry Sleep Solution book). His sleep cycle is very sensitive to change for some odd reason, that's why I know way too much on it since I have done way too much research to try and solve the problem. It drives me crazy that he can sleep a solid 12hr at night and take 2 1 2/2 hour naps, but when it is thrown off we go back to the dreaded 45min.Hope this helps

I was playing waving music in the backround since it was nicer then static and calmed him down when he was colicky, but the doctor said to go back to static or some other constant white noise to get him into the next sleep cycle. Seem to help and I have it on pretty high, and noise when he gets into that light sleep messes up his cycle.

 

When we transitioned to two naps around that age they would also go to bed around 5:30pm because they were sleepy, thats OK! The transition will take a little while and work on everyone's part. You will find they may seem more cranky and need super early bedtime for a while, just work with it.

 

I would say that my babies have kind of put themselves on a version of the 2-3-4 schedule over the last month and it is working well but the last half hour before bed is always abit of a struggle but they have been like that since the day they were born at teatiime! They can now be kept awake longer and more comfortably providing they are entertained i.e go shopping, for a walk or if all else fails tv time! If they get bored we have a meltdown so it's not worth it if we aren't doing much. Can you sleep trai them for naps also? we did 1hr30min nap min when we did CIO AT 5.5MTHS and it is rare that we ever get less than that now. Glad nightime is better for you, makes a HUGE difference doesn't it!!

 

Our girls also put themselves on a 2-3-4 schedule and it's been great so far. They took about 2 weeks to truly get through the process of dropping that third nap with them taking it some days and pushing through on other days. This is how our schedule looks now at 8.5 months.

6:30 wake
7:00 bottle
7:45 oatmeal
8:30 nap #1
10:30 wake up
11:00 bottle
12:00 fruit/lunch
1:45 small bottle to make it through nap if I think they need it
2:00 nap #2
4:00 wake
4:30 bottle
5:15 dinner
***this is where it can get tricky***
6:00 stroll around the neighborhood (this is mostly to keep them entertained)
6:30 baths
7:00 begin floor time...low lights, no loud toys, just some crawling around to get energy out and we read books
7:45 last bottle
8:00 bed

 

Thanks for all of the advice, ladies!

Crazy morning here . . .

The babies started acting tired an hour or less after they woke up. I put DD down and she has been asleep for 2.5 hrs. She has not napped that long in at least a month. I tried to put DS down after DD, but he has refused to nap all morning, after 2 attempts and lots of crying. He is teething, so that could be part of the problem.

Do you think I have been missing their drowsy window and they have been unable to take a nice, long nap? One hour just seems like such a short wake time to me for an almost 8 month old. I usually put them down about 2 hours after they wake, but they show drowsy signs 45 min. to an hour after they wake up for the morning, and that's after sleeping for 12 hours.

I can't believe I'm still trying to figure out this napping business and they are almost 8 months old! Just reread a bunch of sections of HSHHC. Sounds like he recommends 2 hours before the first nap for 5-8 month olds, but possibly only 1 hr. of wake time for post-colic babies. Mine were definitely colicky.

Thoughts???

 

I don't think that is too soon to put them down especially if they are showing signs. Some mornings are like that here and a very good friend of mine told me that her 8 month old twins go down an hour after being awake in the morning. It really depends on the baby. And sometimes one of my girls doesn't sleep at all during the morning.

This nap thing is hard and I wouldn't be surprised if some of us don't get the hang of it until close to a year.

 

Hey Amber, if sleep signs kick in after an hour then it's not to soon at all. If we have had poor naps the previous day or wakeups through the night then the 1st nap can be not very long after waking up. I would do as your doing and follow their ques, just use the book as a guide. I find that if i can crack the 1st nap it sets the day off to a good start, if it's needed early then so be it. If the babies are struggling with teething i give either ibruprofen or paracetomol, they seem to get some relief and nap better. Good luck

 

I don't know which 'sleep training' method recommends it, but like others we found a 2-3-4 schedule worked wonders for us!

We don't 'do' sleep training, but i've read a lot of them to get ideas, and that was one taht really helped us. Basically, it's 1st nap 2 hours after waking, 2nd nap 3 hours after waking from nap #1, and bedtime 4 hours after that. Adjust to your needs (we usually end up 3-3-4). I realized I was trying to keep my girls up WAY to long in the mornings for a while (before I was trying to keep them up to 9:30 or 10, they now take their first nap between 8 and 8:30.)

Our rough schedule is:

5:30 - wakeup (ok, I wish this was a little later)
6:00 - nurse
6:30 - leave for daycare/work (daycare is a 40 minute drive from home (near work), sometimes we have to work to keep them awake. i've found if they fall asleep in the car bad things happen with the nap schedule.)
8:00 - bottle #1
8:30-10:30 - nap #1
11:00 - solids (1 tub each of purees, or finger foods if we're home)
1:00 - bottle #2
1:30-3 - nap #2
3:00 - bottle #3
5:00 - solids at home (finger foods usually)
7:30ish - bedtime.