Anyone want to talk about the 2-1 transition #26

[Kellyjs]

Hey Laura, welcome back! Glad to hear it's going well. Yep, I'd up the A time especially after a good night. O can do an extra 20 mins or so after a fab 12-hr night x

[lauradj]

Thanks for all the suggestions ladies!  It's a huge help.  Pre-transition, T's EASY looks like this:
6am- WU
10am - Nap #1
11:30 - WU
3pm - Nap #2
4:30 - WU
6:15 - BBB, he's in bed by 6:45.

The last two days I've been pushing him to 10:30 and getting still waking him at 11:30, otherwise everything else stayed the same.  I know Tracy says to make sure your LO is sleeping until 7am but that is just not going to happen here; a) it's summer and b) we are not a sleeping in family.  He did pass out in the car ride home today at 2:15 and he's still sleeping (it's now 3:50pm).  I think swimming at the grandparents wiped him out! I just went with it.  If he's tired, he's tired!

[lauradj]

Oops!  Thanks for the link Kellyjs, that was helpful.  My LO is definitely an early riser!  We'll see if some of this tweaking doesn't change things.

[Kellyjs]

Hey lauradj.. Nope, we never got to 7am WU's either! Especially now it's summer. I wouldn't worry about it too much. If you're happy with the earlier day (as I am), there's no need to play about with the wu.

I'd just go with it for now hun.. I never did the short am, long pm naps as O would just take two short naps as I never figured out the correct A in the afternoon. We can do it now she's through the transition though coincidentally!

Personally, I'd leave it where it is for a bit. If you start to get a shorter pm nap, then look at chopping 15mins off the first nap and/or moving the second nap later. Obviously the problem with moving it later is that the day gets longer. I think some pull up to a 14/15hr day through the transition (check out some of busterb's posts on here!), but you'll have to go with what you feel comfortable with. O didn't do so well on anything above a 14hr day, that's why I capped the second CN further and further and extended the first A until we were on one nap.

And swimming is great for getting them to pass out!! Keep us updated, and let us know if he starts to mess about with the second nap or it gets shorter, then we can look at it again. Hth x

[MarciaMSPT]

argh... somehow got jinxed...  rough night two nights ago but possible due to colder weather... really?  It's mid July and it was down to 50 degrees in Indiana! 

Yesterday was rough, only a short 45 min first nap so car napped for 20 later on... slept an 11 night last night...

I changed this:  I decided that my LO's fussy times might be due to hunger... so I feed as usual at 7:10ish am and then I gave him a regular meal at 11.  He was totally happy and sailed till about 12:30pm when he was ready for nap (usually 12) - so will see if feeding him more often helps with his fussy times...  next meal about 3ish and then snack will be around 7ish... any thoughts (even though it's not the eating thread?)

Happy Tweaking!

((Hugs))

[Kellyjs]

Ha got to love tweaking. I've jinxed myself too and got a slightly OT little bubba it seems. Sara on the toddler board thinks with the teething and developmental stuff we've hit on a little OT due to all the playing around at BT. It's driving me crazy as we were doing so well for a while there.

Wrt eating. We play around with that too. Atm we do:
Wu 6.30
Bottle at 7 2oz formula 7oz milk (weaning the bottle. doing sippy cup in the next day or so with this)
Breakfast at 8.30
Snack at 10 usually piece of fruit, rice cakes or breadsticks
Lunch before nap at 12
Snack on wu around 2.30-3 1/2 banana
Tea/dinner 4.45
BT bottle 6.30/6.45

I've found offering a variety of things helps my LO eat more. I can't be bothered making lots for breakfast. It's either muesli or porridge with 2 fruits. Lunch she eats loads as I can do a collection of things like roasted sweet potato wedges, pitta bread with hummus, avocado, tomatoes, cheese followed by a load of grapes and she enjoys picking around them all. Once she's fed up with one lot and shakes her head, I offer something else and so on. Only put a max of three things on her plate then swap things around.

Basically I try and offer food every 2 odd  hours. You might find you either need to give a larger meal at 7 as it's quite a while since his last feed at 3 or offer something in the middle around 5? Even if it's just a piece of fruit or something? Wdyt? X

[lauradj]

He almost slept until 7am today! I heard him chirp at 6:10 and I got up but then he stayed quiet until I went in at 7.  He was either up at 6:10 and just had a good, long think session or he fell back asleep for a bit  .
I'm definitely going to keep him at 10:30am nap time for another few days.  He's never been awesome with quick adjustments and especially with his fluctuating wake up times, I think it will be better in the end. 
The only potential bummer of him sleeping later in the morning is my husband comes home around 6am and he loves being able to have a snuggle before he goes to sleep for the day.  Still, if it means a well resting little boy, they'll survive.  They get their mid-day play sess.

[lauradj]

Well today he was just knackered at 10:15 so I put him to sleep a smidge early, that might bite me in the bottom tomorrow morning!  I was actually hoping to push for a 10:45am for his first nap but that clearly did not work.  I actually wonder if it was because today was rainy for the first time in ages, it might have just mellowed him right out.  Plus he hates when I put the rain cover on the stroller, so he got a little fussy.
It looks like tomorrow is supposed to be a sunny day so I'm going to try for 10:45!  I think if I move his nap time forward by 15 minutes once a week, we should be good.  I'll probably move his second nap forward too until they sort of meet in the middle?

[aozyetis]

Hello all -

I'm posting here for the first time, noticed some good tips and advice and hoping someone might have some insight to share with me on my particular situation

My daughter is 14 months old and her usual day was looking like this up until just over a month ago:

wake 6:30 to 7am
milk immediately after waking
breakfast  8am
nap 10am to 11/11:30am
lunch 12pm
milk immediately before nap at 2pm
wake 3:30/4
snack
dinner 6pm
bedtime 7:30pm

When I returned to work when she was 12 months old she began going to my parents' house 4 days a week and her naps tended to be less consistent and closer to 1 hour 15 min than a full 1.5 hours. It's been almost 2 months now that she's been at my parents' house regularly and the issue we're having now is that as of maybe about a month ago she started to fight the naps altogether - sometimes she'd play for 30 minutes or even longer before falling asleep, if falling asleep at all. Sometimes she'd skip the morning nap but more often she was taking a decent morning nap but skipping the afternoon nap. We figured she's started transitioning from needing 2 naps to just 1. We therefore reduced her morning nap to just 45 minutes and continue to put her down at 2pm for her afternoon nap, hoping she'll feel more tired and sleep right away and not just play. She still takes sometimes 15-20 min or so to fall asleep in the morning, sometimes less but often still takes 30 min or more to fall asleep in the afternoon. We made the room at my parents' house darker - similar to her room at home - and we also just got a proper crib for that room as previously she'd been sleeping in a playpen. Hoping these changes will help some but she's also now fighting her afternoon nap at home and thinking she's fighting it b/c she's still not tired enough. She went a few days where she did not nap at all in the afternoon and then for the past few days she has fallen asleep but often not until as late as 3pm and then only sleeping for one hour. Her bedtime these days has also been pushed out to about 8pm.

Any tips on what we can/should be doing to ensure she consistently takes a longer afternoon nap? We are comfortable letting go of the morning nap if it seems we should, but also realize this can't necessarily be done cold turkey. Also don't want to make her fussy/irritable from not taking a morning nap and then have her reject the afternoon nap b/c she's overtired.

Any tips would be appreciated.

Thank you!

[Kellyjs]

Hi aozyetis,

Welcome to BW! Sounds like everything you're doing is just brilliant! How about you leave the timings where they are if you're not getting EW and chopping the first nap down to 30mins? Hopefully then she'd be more tired for her afternoon nap.  As I've said previously on here, I never did the short am, long am version of the 2-1 as I could never figure out the correct A times to get a long nap in the afternoon! I think if you try 30mins firstly you won't have to lengthen your day anymore for now. What do you think?

Also I found this link really helpful from 2 to 1 nap - how, when and the bumps

Lauradj.. Sounds like it's going well hun and sounds like a great plan. O gets more sleepy on rainy days too.. As do I!! Keep us posted x

[BusterB]

I realise that none of your babies seem to do the short nights that mine does as standard, so it might be tricky to advise - but things seem to be going from bad to worse here and I really don't know which way to jump! Think I just need to sense check it with someone please!

The last 3 nights F has slept 9hrs, 10hr & 9hrs with long NWs.

Last night he treated BT as a nap again (woke after 20m, fed back to slept & then fully awake at 40m) and was then awake until almost 10pm (up at 6am this morning) - he'd only napped 35m between 10:30am & 7pm yesterday as I capped nap 2 to preserve the day, but I let him dictate the morning nap which had been 1hr10.

I'm really struggling to know what to do with his naps now as I don't know if he is OT or UT?! With the short nights and capped naps you'd imagine OT, but I've been giving him 1 longer nap to try and compensate & it feels like it makes things worse not better!

I realise I probably need to push his A times, but after a 9hr night like last night that's tough - he passed out in my arms yesterday morning, after his short night and after just 3hr15 A time! and I couldn't wake him early from the nap to get a longer second A either - he was shattered. But then the rest of the day played out like UT....

So now I don't know whether to try and push A & cap naps, or let him sleep when he's tired? Hubby has thrown his back out so I'm flying solo and really struggling with SUCH long days - yesterday was practically 16 hours!

Is there any decent way to solve the OT/UT mystery??

ETA: was wondering if maybe this is his way of saying he needs just the 1 nap - but there is no way on earth of pushing to a 5hr A after a 9 hr night, so not sure how we get there? I'm worried a v capped nap is going to exacerbate the OT nights (if that's what they are?!)

[Kellyjs]

I think yours is a mystery Busterb! I wouldn't be happy with those night sleeps personally. NS is soooo much more restorative than naps IMO.

I've said it before, but it might be worth doing set nap, BT with yours so he regulates. You know yours can do a stupid amount of A on a short nap so how about setting the nap at a reasonable time after wu.

For example:
Wu 7
Nap 11.30- however long he wants
BT 7 provided nap is 2 hrs long. Anything less, bring BT forward by the time he missed. Ie. 1.5hr nap = 6.30 BT etc etc.

Wdyt??

[BusterB]

Although I love the idea Kelly, how would we ever do set nap & BT with only 10.5hr night sleep?

A set bedtime would never work 2 days running after a 10.5hr night.... the 7pm BT wouldn't be followed by a 7am w/u on day 2, it would be 5:30am and not only would he then massively struggle with a long A time from waking that early - but next BT would be 5/5:30pm, which just won't work for him (or me!)..... And then it would get even earlier on day 3 etc....  see my issue?!

Also any nap/s longer than 1hr30 total seem to affect his nights... I found that when we attempted the 1 nap days before....so that means he needs to be doing 6 hr A because his nights are so short... and there is no way he's there yet! 5hrs catches up with him really quickly with OT!

I've been giving it lots of thought today & trying to work out how to get to the 1 nap & there is only one way I can see it working & that is to alternate 1 & 2 nap days.... but I'm a bit worried that might mess him up more?!

Today I went back to 2 v short naps <1hr and an EBT of 7pm.... BT itself was a smooth operation and although we've already had 3 NWs they have been v short (I didn't even go in for 2 of then) - so he is obviously nice and tired. So we're back in the same cycle of shorter & shorter naps until real OT sets in and I extend naps & then get 3 hr BT/NWs..... very frustrating!

I really appreciate your thoughts & I think after the next decent night with a reasonable w/u time I'll do the 1 nap again & see how we get on! Thanks again for your input! X

[aozyetis]

Thanks for your response Kellyjs!
I have considered trimming down her morning nap even further to 30 min, maybe I'll give it one more week at my parents' place with the new crib and see how goes.
I did read that article - thank you! Very helpful indeed. Looking forward to the days of one deliciously long afternoon nap!

[lauradj]

It sounds like you're having a rough go in your house BusterB!  If it makes you feel any better, my LO was alternately waking between 5:30am and 6:00am for the past two months.  I was able to leave him to chat, attempt self-soothing, until 6am when he did wake early so I wouldn't go in before 6 regardless of wake up time.  Is that a possibility with your LO?
I also stuck with set nap times for my own sanity.  I've done so since DS was really small, so some days he'd be awake for 4hr, sometime 4.5 and I just kept him busy until nap time.  Now that I've shortened his morning nap, he sleeps until 7am but who knows if that will stick.  Just some thoughts.  DS' EASY used to be this:

6am - WU (bottle immediately)
10:00am - Nap #1
11:30 - WU
12:00 - Lunch
2/2:30- Bottle
3:00- Nap #2
4:30- WU
6:45- In bed

The only change I've made is he now goes to sleep at 10:30 instead of 10.  I'm going to leave it like that for a while, he just can't be awake any later.  The irony is that he's actually awake for less time than before!