unhappy after late catnap

[ashopaholicmom]

Hi, not sure if this goes on the nap forum or the EASY forum so please move if im wrong.

My 5mth DS and I have just been working on a 4 hour EASY. But after his afternoon catnap he is cranky cranky and hard to deal with untill bed time, What am I doing wrong? 
Here is our goal schedule:
7am  Bottle
8am  Cereal
9am  Nap
11am Bottle
12pm Cereal and Squash (we started this just this week)
1pm  Nap
3pm Bottle
4pm  Cereal
4:30/5  Catnap
7pm Bottle
7:30  Bed

Modifications:  He wakes up at about 6 or 6:30. some mornings he'll hang out and play, others he demands to eat right away.  We tried df and he woke up every 3 hours through the night every time. so ive stopped that. the problem begins after his 4 feeding with the bottle. he gets soooo sleepy but when he goes down for his catnap at about 4:30  i let him sleep untill 5:30. when i wake him up he is horrible cranky and it make our evening very hard. This of course is also the time i'm trying to cook, handle DH coming home, bath ect... it's the craziest part of the day and my least favorite. Are my feeling rubbing of on him or i'm i not letting him sleep enough/too much?  After rereading this i realize this most likely belong in EASY forum so i will post there as well. sorry.  Any Advice on this afternoon nap ect... is greatly appreciated!

[Mom to M&M]

My DD was always cranky after the catnap too - I think it just wasn't enough sleep for her - and many babies are overtired/overstimulated by that point of the day. How long are his first two naps during the day? Will he take his catnap in a swing or stroller - which would make for a lighter sleep and maybe a less cranky baby?

[ashopaholicmom]

his other naps are about 1.5 hours to 2    sometimes he will wake up after 45 min, but i shush pat him back to sleep. yesterday i tried the on the go catnap, lol  he just stayed awake the whole time. by 7:00 he was out for the night and slept untill 7:00.  Think it would be bad if we just skipped the catnap and moved bedtime to 7:00?   im just afraid at home i won't be able to keep him up.   

[Mom to M&M]

You can certainly try to skip the catnap. Maybe move the first nap to 9:15 instead of 9 (wake him at 11:15 if not up) and second nap from 1:30-3:30 and bedtime 6:45? Or at least do some quiet time during the catnap time - like go for a walk then?

[ashopaholicmom]

great ideas, thank you for talking through this with me. i  think you're right about pushing the naps back, i will try that today. we skipped catnap again yesterday, pushing our bath up to the 5:00 time   It worked out great, even matched up with making evening calmer for me when DH gets home. Needless to say the issue with lo waking at 6am instead of 7am resolved itself when skipping the catnap, so far at least.

[katriona]

glad to hear there was some success! also want to agree with the pp on a stroller nap if a catnap is needed. we're at the same place with our son who is transitioning from 2-1. a catnap in his crib leaves him so fussy and cranky after, but a nap in the stroller is much lighter, and he's happy when he wakes up (i tend to start singing loudly, walk along the roads with more traffic, and stop pushing the stroller). good luck!