3 month old "schedules"

ok -i feel like i'm going crazy. why don't my babies sleep well during the day? i'm folling the healthy sleeps habits, happy child book but it just doesn't seem to be working. they wake up like at 8. back to bed by 9:30. they only sleep for about an hour, but by the tiem i get them both to bed, i only have like 15-30 minutes of spare time to play with Gavin. then they eat, play and back to bed. they never nap longer than 1 hour. is this normal?

what are your schedules like? i know we don't really have schedules at this age, but about how often do yours sleep?

THANK yOU

 

ok -i feel like i'm going crazy. why don't my babies sleep well during the day? i'm folling the healthy sleeps habits, happy child book but it just doesn't seem to be working. they wake up like at 8. back to bed by 9:30. they only sleep for about an hour, but by the tiem i get them both to bed, i only have like 15-30 minutes of spare time to play with Gavin. then they eat, play and back to bed. they never nap longer than 1 hour. is this normal?

what are your schedules like? i know we don't really have schedules at this age, but about how often do yours sleep?

THANK yOU

 

I am pretty fortunate in this departent. Mine are 14 weeks old now.

If they are not up by 8 a.m., I get them up and feed them. They play for about 1.25-1.5 hours and down for their nap. Then they either wake up or I wake them up by noon and repeat with the play time part. Bottles again at 4. Now the evening nap is not regular and I never have a clue as to how long or how short and it goes from 1-2 hours. Bath at 7:30, bottle at 8 and generally in bed around 8:30 or so.

I have to say that both of my twins wake up during their naps and go back to sleep for either their morning or afternoon ones. The one twin was extremely easy with the sleep department and the other one, we had to slowly work with as to watching cues, etc. And this was all with minimal crying. I am a huge fan of schedule and watching their cues and not having them over tired. Sleep begets sleep like someone else always says!

 

Wake up about 7am. I nurse on demand, so a feeding schedule doesn't really exist. They both nap around the same time for the morning nap, which is usually around 815-830. Our dd sleeps about 2-3 hours and our ds sleeps about 1.5-2 hours. I tend to wake up our dd at 3 hours if she hasn't woken up. Their next nap really depends on when they woke up, as they last about 1.5 hours awake. Depending on how long their nap is, they could have about 3-4 naps a day. I cut them off around 430/500 as they go to bed between 630/700. Our ds is in bed around 630 and our dd around 7. She is a little more tricky when it comes to sleep. We're still trying to figure her out a bit.

I try not to let them sleep past 715 or so, as it messes up their first nap of the day. I really appreciate them sleeping at the same time Now, night time sleep is different. They get up any where between 2-4 hours. Usually, their first stretch is the longest. I also follow suggestions from HSHHC. There are some really good ideas in there. At the present time, we are experiencing some regression with their night sleep. A few weeks ago, our dd was waking up once or twice, and now it's three or four times. I'm sure they'll figure it out sooner or later.

 

how do you get them to nap so long?

mine are up in exactly one hour and always upset

 

I have given up trying to schedule them! Mine usually wake up around midnight and are awake until at least one. Then they wake up at 3am and are awake until 4:50-5:00. Then they wake up around seven. AFter that they tag team us all day! There is always one awake. They both finally usually fall asleep around 10:00 at night!

 

Our ds tends to wake up after 45 min to an hour. I go in there and try to soothe him (i.e. shhhhing, rubbing belly, pop paci back in, etc...) I rarely nurse him, but have on occasion. This works most of the time. Sometimes, he's wide awake after an hour and nothing seems to soothe him back to sleep.

Now, I will nurse our dd, as other options don't seem to be as effective for her, although she usually doesn't wake up. She tends to stay asleep. I can hear her moving around after 40 min or so, but she can return to deep sleep on her own. She is actually harder to put down initially than our ds. Every child is different. I just try to be consistent. I'm actually trying to figure out different ways to get our dd to sleep without nursing. So far nursing seems to be the only way.

 

You can find some more info on babies napping habits for 0-3 here and on babies 3-6 here.

Also TSers have posted their 4 month schedules here.

 

We don't really have a schedule for our girls. They are slowly starting to create their own though. They wake up around 7am'ish and then feed and then play and nap. They feed, play & nap in that order every 2.5 - 3 hours. Their naps are also short and are usually only about 20-40 minutes long (usually 30). They go to bed around 9pm'ish and sometimes wake up in the middle of the night, sometimes they don't.

 

Our girls are usually in bed for the night by 7pm. Kathryn usually wakes at around 3 or 4am for a bottle, but Julia sleeps through. (Kathryn is smaller so she needs that extra feeding.) They start making noises (not crying) by about 6am but I don't go in for them until around 7am when they have their first feeding. They aren't able to stay awake much past 8 or 8:30am at which time I try to settle them for a nap. If we are lucky they sleep for 30 to 40 minutes. The rest of the day is a mess. They "tag team" us with naps. It can be so frustrating. Just as one goes down the other wakes up. It seems that they have developed their night schedule and morning nap schedule but haven't fallen into an afternoon routine yet. We are all working on it. I keep hoping it will all fall in to place soon. I would love for them to nap a little longer than 30 minutes in the morning and a nice long nap in the afternoon, but I won't be greedy. They do great at night for now.
By the way, we follow the Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child as much as possible. The book makes it seem so easy, but in reality it is extremely difficult. You have to work on it constantly. You have to watch the baby's cues very closely. That's how we realized we were putting them to bed too late. When we first started putting them to bed at 7pm we felt guilty but they seem perfectly happy. In fact, sometimes Julia (who of late is sleeping through the night) can barely make to 7pm and we have to put her to bed even earlier. We were worried about missed feedings but so far both babies are gaining weight just fine and our pedi is pleased.

 

FireWifeFL
you just described my day and night. they got the whole night thing down but the day-not so much. maybe it is just the age and they will eventually get a routine.

thank you everyone.