help with 5 month old twins - naps

[diamante67]

This is my very first time posting here so I hope I am doing this right...
My 5 month old twins (in two days) used to take their naps without too much problems. Especially with my daughter, which is pretty much an angel, everything was smooth sailing so much so that we would impress our guests with our napping routine... we would notice the sleepy signs, she would take her pacifier, be rocked a little and then put in bed and that was the end of it. My son was a little more complicated in that he would need something to "focus on" when in bed  and every 3-4 days it would have to be different... a rubber duckie, a book, etc. If we were missing the cues and he would get overtired, he would easily agitated in bed (moving his arms up and down frantically) so sometimes I would have to sing to him to calm him down. Anyway, for several weeks things were more or less under control, especially with my Daughter. Now it's been a whole week where it seems that everything is going crazy. They look tired but when they get to bed they complain and I spend hours trying to calm them down. typically this involves giving them the pacifier after they pull it out with their little hands, singing if they get agitated, picking them up if they get very upset, wondering whether I put them in bed too early, etc.
They used to go down for their naps every 1.5-2 hours but now, even though they seem tired after 1.5 hours, they would still stay awake for another hour or more. Maybe it's just normal for their age but dealing with two fussy babies at nap time (3+ times a day) is a nightmare. I am just trying to set some sort of routine (and coincidentally they seem to be more fussy since I started this?): They get 6 bottles a day (190 ml for Jaco and 160 ml for Sofia) and solids 2 times a day; they get up anytime between 5 and 7 am - this makes it a little hard to have a routine but it's coming together. Their naps used to be at around 8, 11 (in the stroller usually), 2pm and 5 pm. but now it's impossible to put them down to sleep at 2pm and they might stay up until 3 or 4pm and they might have a short nap at that point so that they get totally overtired. Bedtime is at 7-7:30 if they don't get the last nap at 5-ish, 8pm if they do get a catnap in the late afternoon.

Sorry for such a long post... if you can shed some light on what's going on with my kids I would highly appreciate it.

[Colesmom]

Hi there,

You don't mention how long their naps are so I'm just going to give you some basic ideas.

At this point it would be preferable to have 3 naps, 2 longer ones of 1.5+ hours and a catnap of 30-60 minutes long.  Bedtime is best between 6-8pm as you've got going...but I'm thinking you should aim for 7pm as opposed to 8pm as that is quite late for such a young baby.  Also, if you have trouble getting a nap, or if the last nap is short, don't be afraid to put them to bed very early...say 6-6:30 so that they aren't way overtired at bedtime.  You don't mention how they sleep at night, but if they start having poor naps it will effect their nighttime sleep as well.

At this age your babies likely get a second wind after seeming tired at 1.5 hours.  I would try for A time closer to 2.0-2.5 hours.  They are likely refusing the 2pm nap as they aren't tired enough.  Babies tend to like longer A time as the day progresses.  So you may look at something like 2, 2.25, 2.5 and 2.5.  You'd be surprised at what a difference 15 minutes could make...even 5 minutes for some babies.  It's a fine line between tired and overtired...it will take some work to figure out with each of your los.

What you're going through is perfectly normal.  Babies brains organize their night sleep from 0-3 months and their day sleep from 3-6 months so they are just adjusting.

HTH, good luck!

[diamante67]

thanks a lot for the reply and for shedding some light on the A time getting longer. That seems to explain while they can go for 3 hours in the last stretch while in the morning they seem to be done after 1 hour and a half. I did notice the "second wind" too: sometimes they take the pacifier and after few minutes they are ready to party again! now that I understand that it happens a lot, I won't be on a "crusade" to make them sleep right away: hopefully, I'll get less frustrated, and so will they. The naps are all over the place in terms of lenght: from 40 minutes to 2 hours+. Today it went a little better (so far!) and, as you said, it will take some time to "figure them out" all over again 
In terms of sleeping through the night, my son goes to bed at around 7-7:30, and then he sleeps until 5-6am; my daughter goes to sleep between 7 and 8:30 (later if she took a nap at 5:30 or so) and then she wakes up any time between 5 and 7am (but she needs a pacifier at ~4am to keep sleeping).
I'll see how the next days will go.

Thanks again for your advice!