lo taking a while to fall asleep for naps

[nickylab]

My lo is 5 months old. We have gotten on a routine at night and our lo has started sleeping through the night. She now puts herself to sleep. The problem I am having is when I put her down for her naps, she lays in her bed for about 45 minutes playing before she falls asleep. She doesn't cry or anything, just rolls around and plays. I put her down as soon as she shows signs of being tired. Sometimes that is after she has been up for about 1 hour and 30 min or 2 hours. Sometimes I put her down earlier than that when she acts really tired. She can be so tired and as soon as I put her in her crib she perks up and starts to play. Anyone else experience this and have suggestions? She does not do this at night. She falls asleep within 5 minutes at night.

I am not sure if you have seen my previous posts, but she also is still waking from naps at the 45 minute mark. I have tried EVERYTHING to extend her naps and nothing has worked. Every once in a while she will sleep longer but this is rare.

Thank you

[empowered mama]

hi there,

I am thinking your LO could likely use an increase in A time before you put her down for her nap.  Oftentimes, sleepy cues can be unreliable and they can give you these cues around the times they are used to going to bed, when in reality they need to stay up longer to be tired enough to take a long nap. 

The average A time for a LO this age is 2 - 2.25 hrs so you could shoot for that range regardless of sleepy cues and see if she settle more easily for the naps.

but she also is still waking from naps at the 45 minute mark

My guess for this is that she either needs an increase in A time, or it could be developmental as they often have a hard time at this age making the transition to the 2nd half of the nap.  My LO struggled with this and a few days after his 6 month birthday was able to make the transition on his own. 

But let's tweak the routine a bit first and see if that helps things

[nickylab]

Thank you for your input. I have increased her awake time since this am to 2 hours and she falls asleep faster, but is waking up after 20 minutes instead of 45 minutes. Should I give it a couple of days or go back to shorter A times.

[empowered mama]

How old is your LO?  Did she just turn 5 months or further into it?

I would give it a few days and see what comes of it.  It may be that her body needs to adjust, or even that she could use more A time than 2 hours.

[nickylab]

Her 5 month old birthday is today.