4-Hour EASY tweaking...

[Karin3]

Hello Everyone,

I recently switched (8 days ago) dd over to a 4-hour EASY.  I did this because she wasn't hungry at 3 and 3.5, as well as her naps all of a sudden became short which was never a problem before. 

I've ran into a little bit of a problem with the afternoon "cat nap" and getting her down at bedtime.  While she seems OK with the E part of this equation, she's having a little difficulty with the A time that goes along with it.     She is about 15 wks but she was 5 wks early.  She's already on the 50% line though on the height/weight chart so I feel comfortable feeding her every 4 hours BUT maybe she's not developmentally ready to go for 2 hours of A time? 

Here's a rough sketch of our routine:

E: 0700-0720
A:
S: 0830-1100
E: 1100-1120
A:
S: 1230-1430 (wakeup time on this nap varies quite a bit; she'll wakeup anywhere between 1400-1500)
A:
E: 1500-1520
A:
S: This nap is all over the place.  Sometimes, she won't even take it.  I try to catch the first yawn.  If I don't see a yawn, I try to wind her down around 1645.
A: 1800-1830 Bath
E: 1830-1850
A: 1850- ?? 
DF:  2230
Night Feed: 0300

I try to have her asleep between 1930 & 2000.  I'm successful about 75% of the time.  Then there are nights like tonight where me and DH tag team and it's 2100...   Anyway, I was thinking there is something in my EASY that needs to be tweaked and I'm just not catching it.  Anything stand out to anybody?

Thanks!

Karin

[estherofi20]

Hello there, when my DS was 12WO i changed him to a 4hr routine, but he wasn't capable of a 2hrs Atime, so i i put him to nap at 1.5hrs, i know it was a lot of daytime sleep, but some babies need a bit more sleep than others, and my DS was back then one of them. So he had two 2.5hr naps and one 1.5hr "catnap". I only started reducing his daytime sleep (at about 4.5 MO), when he started waking up at like 4am and chat for an hour or so, and that's when i extended his Atime and reduced his naptime, so he had 2 hr naps and a 1hr catnap. So my suggestion would be that its better to have them a bit earlier to nap, that have an overtired baby on your hands. here is how our day looked back then:

7:30 wake up and feed
8:30 start wind down
9:00 sleep
12:30 feed
1:30 start wind down
2.00 sleep
4:30 feed
5:30 start wind down
6:00 catnap
7:00 bath and massage
7:30 bottle and book
8:00 sleep

HTH

[Karin3]

Thanks Esther!

I'll give that a try.  I'll let you know in a couple of days how it goes.   

Karin