Wow, we have a clever bunch of babies!
Bianca, sounds like we're doing a similar thing at night so that's good to get confirmation. I like your idea of not refeeding at 7am if she's already fed at 6-6.30am but just adjusting the schedule later in the day - I think that would work better for us. The other day I ended up doing 3 cluster feeds before 11am since she wasn't eating properly because of her 5am feed -but it all worked out in the end.
Caroline - Danielle has also been doing some early morning wake ups and I've found if it's 5am-7am she will want to be up for the day - 5am's just way too early. But it's not the same every night and like Bianca suggested, the DF seems to bring the night feed in earlier for us and then she's likely to sleep right past the 5am point and go 6.30-7am - so prefer the earlier night feed rather than too close to morning.
James 030405 - nothing wrong with tummy sleeping if that's the informed decision that you've made - there are a lot of mums on this site who's babies do tummy sleep. Just like my non-vaccination decision, it's a choice as a parent that you make.
kq - I found when Danielle was not staying on feeding for long that for me was a sign to stretch out her day feeds, just take it gradual and see how it goes. Danielle was always a 5-10min feeder, on the 4hr schedule she now feeds 15-20mins but it's only now at 4mths that it works really well for her. When I first tried the 4hr routine she wasn't feeding long enough to stimulate my milk supply so I had a drop and went back to 3hrly feeds for a week or so and then tried again, now she feeds for longer and my milk supply keeps up great.
Erin, I also plan on holding off on solids even though we're also recommended 4-6mths. Most mums I know do it sooner rather than later though. I didn't with Nathan until he was 5.5mths. Although at our well-child visit the other the nurse suggested I do solids since she's still waking once or twice a night - my question back to her was well if she only feeds every 4hrs and isn't even enthusiastic about that (I actually have to offer her food at 4hrs she doesn't ask for it), surely food will take away her desire for more milk? she had to agree - made me mad actually because surely that would then mean a decrease in supply and the possibility of loosing my milk supply? Too bad if I accepted her advice blindly without questioning it.
I've suddenly noticed that Danielle can stay up for 3hrs or so! A few times lately she's had her usual 45min morning nap and then stayed awake till her 12.30pm nap which is her big 2.5hr one. It actually works better that way. It only works though if she's woken at 6.30am or later - otherwise she needs another little nap prior to 11am to keep her going until the big sleep (I don't like to mess with this one since it's the same time that Nathan sleeps).
Anyone's babies chatting in the night and then going back to sleep? Danielle's been doing this for the last week and sometimes after a night feed does it, but fortunately we've only had one incident of her waking at 5am and not resettling.
So last night/today we look like this:
11pm woke for a feed (I'd decided not to do DF)
4.30am feed and back to sleep after 15mins of chatting
6.30am woke and chatted to herself
7am up
7.30am feed
8am nap (45mins)
11am feed
12.30pm nap (she'll sleep until 2.30-3pm)
3pm feed
4.30pm nap (45mins)
6.45pm feed
7pm bed
Have a good day for all of us "down under" and evening the rest of you!