Please Help: 2 naps to 1

With my daughter, it was obvious when she no longer needed her morning nap (she fought it/skipped it)
My boys will sleep for 45-75 minutes in the morning if I put them down and then again for another 60-75 minutes in the afternoon. The problem I think is that even though the go to bed at the same time (between 7-7:30) they have been waking up at 5am instead of their normal 6am. This has been going on for a week now. I am not getting them out of their cribs until 5:30ish (when they start to scream and I do not want my daughter to have to wake up), but I was thinking that maybe they are getting too much sleep during the day?
Did anyone else have to force the transition to one nap or should i just wait until they start fighting the morning nap?

Thanks alot

 

With my daughter, it was obvious when she no longer needed her morning nap (she fought it/skipped it)
My boys will sleep for 45-75 minutes in the morning if I put them down and then again for another 60-75 minutes in the afternoon. The problem I think is that even though the go to bed at the same time (between 7-7:30) they have been waking up at 5am instead of their normal 6am. This has been going on for a week now. I am not getting them out of their cribs until 5:30ish (when they start to scream and I do not want my daughter to have to wake up), but I was thinking that maybe they are getting too much sleep during the day?
Did anyone else have to force the transition to one nap or should i just wait until they start fighting the morning nap?

Thanks alot

 

My boys are still taking their 2 naps a day. They are not close to being ready to give up their morning nap.

I'm curious how you would force a transition to 1 nap a day...

 

It might just be a phase. Josh does that from time to time i.e. wake up around 5-530am for 3-5 days. Sometimes he goes back to sleep or I go get him by 6am so he does not wake up the other kids. But then I am forced to wake Zach up by 615 so they can be on the same schedule

But my boys did not transition from 2-1 naps until 18 months or so (last summer).

So hang in there! Maybe it will be over soon!~

 

thanks - i'm hoping this is a phase! They go down in the morning wiht no arguement, so my gut does tell me they still need it.
By force the 1 nap, I would just get them out of the house and be active - go to the playground, etc. Then put them down for 1 nap at around 12pm, instead of their second nap time which is around 2pm now.

I'll wait another few days and see if they work it out themselves
thanks!

 

I agree that it might be too early to switch to 1 nap. Maybe you can try putting them down for bed a little later?

 

The same thing is happening to us (those early wakeups) and mine are almost exactly the same age as yours. In our case I know it's not that they're getting too much sleep during the day, because they take one nap at daycare, and it's 1.5 hours on a good day (45 min on a bad one). Yet they still wake up at 5/5:30.

They get 2 naps on weekends (about 1 hr in the morning and 1.5-2 hrs in the afternoon), which seems to still work well. I've actually been wondering if mine would sleep later if they were still getting 2 naps everyday! But maybe the early waking is just a phase and it's totally unrelated to their nap schedule.

Tulip, FWIW, the way they "force the transition" at daycare is they simply keep them up all morning. They take them outside in mid-morning, when they start to get sleepy, and have them do something active. Then they have lunch at 11ish and right to bed afterwards. It seems to work for them because the environment is so stimulating, but I'm not ready to do it at home.