Really nervous about moving from 2 naps to 1 starting tomorrow...need quick support

So tomorrow is the big day...moving from 2 naps to 1. I'm so nervous about it.

(my twins just turned 15 months).

I'm planning on taking them out of the house around 8:30 till about 10am...taking them to the gym child care center...I'm gonna work out and "hope" that all the excitement about new toys and people will be enough to keep them awake (they usually go for a nap around 9;45ish and still till 10:30).

My plan is to leave the gym at 10am..be home by 10:15, plop them in their high chairs for a "snack" and HOPE to keep them awake till 11am (and hope they sleep till 1 or 2 even better)

My concern is that I might only get a 2 hour nap out of them and they will be royal monsters by 5pm....just in time for DH to come home and dinner time. Their normal bedtime would be 7pm, but I know I will have to put them to bed sooner...maybe like 6pm for a while.

Here is my question...if their bedtime gets moved up to 6pm...will they wake up for me earlier than their regular 6:45ish then??? Probably...that is gonna be soooo hard with the morning routine of my husband getting ready for work and me getting our 4 year old ready for preschool...she's up at 6;15 and out of the house by 6;45.

At this age, how long should they be able to stay awake without melting down into a fit of overtired?

Sorry for all the specific times/details and such, but looking to those who have been there to maybe offer something up I haven't thought of.

Anything else I should be considering??

I'm sooooo nervous about this transition.

 

Why are you dropping their morning nap? Just curious. They just dont seem to be ready for it, if I read you post right. My oldest dropped his morning nap at 18 almost 19 months.

 

If I'm reading your post right, it sounds like they have a very consistent schedule right now? If so, I wouldn't change anything. The only reason I changed my twins to one nap at 13 months was because THEY decided it was time and refused to take their second nap anymore.

 

Mine changed to one nap at 12 months because they basically started playing through their entire nap and not falling asleep until 11 or 12. They never batted an eye when we switched. their bedtime and wake up time stayed the same. Currently (and they were the same 2 months ago) they get up around 8, take their nap between 1 and 3:30 or 4, and go to bed around 7:30

 

I switched our boys from 2 naps to 1 nap around 17 months old (15 months adjusted). They were fighting their afternoon nap so bad it didn't make sense to force it on them. I am assuming your twins have been fighting a nap as well. When we switched we just went cold turkey. Our boys wake up around 6:30am. Instead of putting them down for a nap at around 10:30am with lunch at 12pm after they woke up, we now feed them lunch at 11am and they go down for naps at 11:30am (with NO resistance at all!). They usually sleep close to 2 hours but sometimes they only sleep 90 minutes. Then we put them in their cribs at 7:45pm and they are asleep by 8pm and wake around 6:30am (they've never slept more than 9-10.5 hours at night ever). I was so nervous of the change and for a while I figured 2 naps spread out through the day at only 30-60 minutes each (total of 90 min to 2 hours) was better than one nap of 90min to 2 hours. But they do SO well with this schedule and it is so nice that they don't fuss or play in their cribs for 30+ minutes before finally going to sleep. Hope your transition goes as easy as ours did!

 

I think they are ready because their a.m. nap has become playtime and if I'm lucky, after putting them in their cribs around 9:30am, they'll fall asleep around 10:10 and I get them up at 10:30 (to preserve the afternoon nap). So I'm thinking it's time to drop it....plus, they'll start going to daycare in January and I want them to try and get use to a later nap. Currently, my day care try to put the younger toddlers down after lunch at 11:00 (so around 11:30ish).

I'm so anxious about this and hope the transition goes well...my biggest fear is them not taking a long enough nap and being super crabby around 5 pm...then when I have to put them to bed earlier, them waking up earlier too and the craziness in our house this will cause in are a.m.

Sigh.

 

It might take a couple days or week for them to get adjusted to one nap. I think you have a good plan in mind. When I put my two to bed earlier they did wake up about 30 minutes earlier. Once their nap started to get longer (2-3 hours versus one hour), I put them to bed at regular time and they were back to their regular wake up schedule. Good luck!

 

I dropped to 1 nap at 13 months because mine started to protest and scream at morning nap and I could only get 30 min max, so cut it out.

To be honest, it was a nightmare for the first 2-3 days trying to keep them awake long enough. Also, I just started to get 2 solid hours of nap (12-2pm) from them, before it was only about 1 hour.

Mine now wake up at 8 am
Nap 12pm-2pm
Bed 8 pm

If I put them to bed earlier than 8 pm, they wake up at 6 am on the dot.

I hope it works out for you, but if it were me, I would not go to the gym on the first day since I thinkthey are guaranteed to have a meltdown and you probably won't work out anyway.

Let us know how it goes and good luck ;-)

 

We just finished doing the transition down to one nap. My girls are 14 months now. It has taken weeks to get them to where I want. They wake approx 6:30 or 7am. Nap is now 12-2 (if they go a bit longer, thats a bonus)and bedtime is 7pm. We started doing nap at 11am because they just couldn't stretch it out. I slowly worked them towards 12 noon over a few weeks. There were some painful naps where they woke too soon and it made for a looonggggg afternoon. I do a drink and small snack at 10:30 now so that at 11:30 they can have lunch and then its off to bed. I do the same things as you, try to plan a morning activity to pass the time. The only thing I find is they fall asleep in the car, usually on the way home from playing, so I try to not go too far away. A few times I have gone a 1/2 hr away and then that was it, they wouldn't go down for that nap! Good luck

 

I agree that maybe they just aren't ready for one nap. My girls started going between one and two naps when they started day care. Some days they still need two depending on how cranky they are. When i was switching them though I just pushed back their morning nap from 9:30 to about 10:30 and their afternoon nap as well instead of 1 to about 3, then eventually you should be able to put their morning nap at about 11:30 and they sleep until 2 or 3 and be good for the rest of the day. but, dont be overly concerned if one day they only take one nap and others still need two. they will let you know what they need/want.