3-2 transition: How to adjust E and S times?

[Kristin.S]

Hi! My son is ready to drop the afternoon CN, but I'm not sure what his new schedule should look like if I start to stretch his A time to 3 hrs. He still usually takes one 2 hr nap a day (and the second nap is either 1.5 or 1.75). If I stretch his A to 3 hrs in the morning, he would only have time for a 1.5 hr nap before his next feed. Or do I push out his feed by 30min if he sleeps longer? I'm confused by how his E and S times should adjust for the longer A time. Thanks for your help!

Here is his current EASY:
7a- wake and eat (sometimes wakes earlier but I don't feed him until 7)
9a- sleep
11a- wake and eat
1:30- sleep
3p- wake and eat
5:15- CN
6:15- bath
6:30- eat
7- sleep for the night
11- DF

If he wakes early in the morning, like 6a, then I can see him stretching until 9 for his first nap, and he can still sleep for 2hrs and wake to eat at 11. But what if I wake him at 7 to eat?
Also, if he sleeps until 11, wakes to eat, then is up for 3 hrs, then he wouldn't take his 2nd nap until 2p, which would only give him an hour to sleep before his next feeding at 3. Do I just cut naps shorter or push feed times later to accommodate 3hrs of A?

Thanks!
Kristin

[nevinsmama]

Hi there! How old is LO? That is a lovely routine you have, looks like the little guy loves his sleep! If he keeps sleeping until closer to the 2 hour mark, I would let him.  If he wakes earlier, consistently, you may need to shift things around or even top him up as he is loving those long naps and wouldn't want hunger to wake  him. I just don;t think you will know for sure until you try! HTH!

[Martini~]

Hi Kristin! I get your point about naps interferring good sleep. I was also panicking and atakiem everybody what to do not to miss E. Is your LO 6mo already? Is he taking any solids? You would have basically two options:
- if not eating solids yet, top him 30min before nap let say at 9am
- than feed him at 11:30 (milk) and offer another top up at 13:30
- and move 3pm milk to 4pm;
- BT at 7 and milk around 6:45-7:00

-if he is eating solids, there probably won't be a need to top him up as small solid meal 1h after milk will get him through next feed (11:30 and 4pm)

Regarding A time, your LO seems like a hsn (high sleep needs) and you probably should be able to go with shorter A (2,5h is enough) and still work on 2 long naps. Two 2h naps sometimes may mean disturbed night sleep as LO has slept too much during the day, but in your case it shouldn't be a problem as he is sleeping 12h at night and more than 4h during day!

Your sample routine:
7am WU and BF
8:00 solids or milk top up (milk can be closer to nap so ie 9:00)
9:30-11:30 nap 2h
11:30 BF
12:30 solids or milk top up (milk can be closer to nap so ie 13:30)
14:00-16:00 nap
19:00 BT (3h here but after two long naps during day it should be fine for him especially that last 30-40min is bath, feed so wind down).

[Kristin.S]

Hello and thank you for the replies!
Apologies I neglected the important detail of his age...yes, he will be 6 months next week. He started on solids about 2 wks ago, so I'm giving him a bit of food an hour after his 7a feeding and an hour after his 3p feeding (I just realized I should have included that in his EASY, but he's not actually eating much yet . He's EBF, so I'd prefer not to add extra feed times to his schedule and get him dependent on that (I'm assuming that's what you mean by top off?). I'm thinking solids may work to hold him over, now that I know I should push the E time out a bit to accommodate the increased A.

He was sleeping through the night, but then started night wakings about a month and a half ago. I attributed this to developmental advance (he's a tummy sleeper and started rolling to his back really well, which would then wake him up). When he wakes, he's up for an hour and a half, usually from 3-4:30, which is no fun. Now he can roll both ways, and we had a couple days last week where he slept through... finally! There didn't seem to be a connection to whether he kept or dropped the CN unfortunately (I tried both last week). But I think it's time to drop the CN, given his long awake times in the middle of the night, and he also sometimes wakes at 5 or 6a. I think two 2hr naps is too much for him at this age, so I usually just let one nap go for 2hrs and the other for 1.5 (he usually does this himself, but if not I'll wake him after 1.5 on the 2nd nap). So his 2nd nap I would start at 14:30 if he had a long one in the morning.

Thanks for the sample schedule. As of now, I only go 3.5 hours between the last two Es, so I feed him at 3 and again at 6:30 so he keeps a 7 or 7:30 bedtime. If I push his afternoon E to 4, then it would only be 2.5 hrs between feedings. Is this ok if the usual spacing is supposed to be 4 hrs?

Thanks for your help!
Kristin

[Martini~]

My DS never did a proper 4h EASY in the afternoon, no matter if he is on bottle or EBF:).
When he was younger we were doing cluster feeding in the afternoon/evening:
- when o 3h EASY it was 4pm, 6pm, 7:15
- when on 4h EASY it was 3pm, 5:30pm, 7:15 and than 4pm, 6:45&7:15 (before and after bath, one sided feeds).
- now we are having a tea at 5pm and milk feeds 2:30 and 6:30 (without it, we probably would still cluster feed!).

Those little kiddos are really hungry in the evenings! Like they know they have to tank up for night:).

[Kristin.S]

Ok, thank you! Yes, there is no way he can get to 4hrs in the evening..he is usually starving at 3.5, so I'm sure he won't mind a shorter gap. I agree, they somehow seem to know that the need to eat a bunch in the evening to get through the night! He is also always more hungry after a bath, so I usually do bath, feed and then to sleep. Thanks for your help...Ill give this schedule tweak a try and let his E times push out a bit. K