2-1 transition - advice please on a 12 mo

[Martini~]

Let see how it goes! With 6:30am WU 2pm nap is 7:30h later which is very late in my opinion but maybe short A later will compensate.
However I would be tempted to push her routine for let's say 8am/8-9pm so to have nap after 5,5-6h after WU. If she did fine on yesterday routine I would keep pushing her nap closer to 2pm as you'd like to.

[Canadian Nat]

Hi, well last night was a right off...purely cause I'm in the same room with her...I woke her up at midnight and she was awake for 1.3/4 hrs...I'm shattered. ..

So, let's forget about last night...

BTW 8am start to the day just won't work as we often need to be out by 8.15am...Plus the 2yr old is up around 6.30/7am.

Since last night was so bad I really don't know what to do for the best today.  She's so tired less than 3hrs after WU...What would you do? I don't think she'll even make it to 11am...

[Martini~]

She probably was shattered after yesterday Hon, but don't worry - she will get back to her routine. Probably short catnap in the morning could work but I guess it's too late now so just let her sleep on her nap for 2-2,5h and let's hope she will catch up.

So what's the best time for you to start the day? 730 would be an option? I guess that it won't be long until you have a choice - either cap the nap or offer shorter nights. So than you may go for a longer nap and shorter nights so you have a reasonable nap time.

But for now I would aim for the routine:

7:00/7:30 WU (right now she is closer to 5:30 and you get her up at 6am - yes? so we need a 1,5h push)
12:30-2:30 nap (as right now she goes till 11am, with WU push, you can have later nap)
8:00/8:30pm BT

To achieve it, I would push the nap but not by 2-3h as you did yesterday accidentally but let say 20-30min every 3-4 days (you have to judge if she needs more to adjust). When you are on above routine, you may try to push the nap later but till offer 8/8:30pm latest BT and maybe she will accept longer A in the morning and shorter in the evening.

Btw - I am NOT the toddler sleep expert for sure - but with 6:30WU, a nap around 2pm isn't late for a 2yo toddler? Maybe here there is an option for an earlier nap? This might be a totally stupid question, but worth asking:). There is also a board here I guess called "two under two" and for sure there are a lot of mummies with toddlers around so you may start a thread maybe on EASY board and ask how others deal with sleep of baby-toddler combo. I am sure someone can have some good advice!

[MasynSpencerElliotte]

With all my kids, as toddler in the 18-30 month range, naptime worked best about 5/5.5 hrs after wake up...so that ended up being around 1:00 give or take 30 min. We dropped my oldest's nap when DD2 was 6 months so I have never had to co-ordinate naps at all.

If wake up needs to be 7/7:30 or so then I would plan the day from that.

[Canadian Nat]

Hi

Thanks for your thoughts both of you.  I appreciate your example day for the ideal time for her at the moment, but I think the start to the day needs to be about 6.30am at the moment as she is still having a morning bottle.  I also need time to get that done as well as breakfast and get them both dressed and me before we have to leave to get to nursery/work.  So, 6.30am is the latest I want her to get up at the moment.  Perhaps when I have dropped that morning WU bottle (about the end of January I think), then perhaps I will aim for WU at 7am as that would tie in with the 2 year old waking up about then too.  But for now, I need a plan for 6.30am wake up and I really don't favour BT at 8/8.30pm since it is really late and I don't get anytime to finish up things for the day before I too need to go to bed as I'm so sleep deprived! 

Is there any way that I can still get a WU at around 6.30am (thinking about moving to 7am at the end of the month), while also giving a 7pm BT?

Thanks for your guidance on posting on the other thread too.  I may well do that to get other views from those with 2 under 2.

Just to update you:
Today she woke at 6.30am.
7am - Bottle
7.45am - breakfast
10am  - snack
10.30am - nap (she was sooo tired from the bad night)
12.50am - WU from nap
1.15pm - lunch
3.30/4pm - snack
5.15pm - dinner
6.45pm - BT starts
6.50am - bottle
7pm - asleep in my arms unfortunately as sooo tired.

WDYT?  Perhaps try that catnap..?  Don't know...

[Canadian Nat]

Hello

Well last night she woke wet through so that was another night that was a right-off.  She also took about an hour to resettle after I changed her...

So, today went like this:

6.30am - WU
7am - bottle
7.15am - breakfast
10am - snack
11.30am - nap
1.30pm - WU
1.50pm - lunch
3.30 - snack
5.40pm - late dinner (just the way it went...)
7pm - bottle
7.30pm - asleep

She seemed to survive quite well on that 2 hour nap.  However, dinner being a bit late as preps were a bit longer than expected and started late, meant that she only had half of her BT bottle...So, I suppose tonight will be ruined by her waking up hungry..?  Who knows...

[MasynSpencerElliotte]

At this age a smaller bottle should not really affect night sleep. Mine has outright refused bedtime milm and sttn so it is less of an impact. Might be worth sizing up in diapers at night! Personally I have not offered a catnap after we were well onto one nap.

[Canadian Nat]

Hello

I've been seeing how things goes over the last couple of days. 

The last two nights she slept through (making the odd cry out and then settling etc. but not needing me to get up and help her).  She did wake at 5.45am after the first of these two nights, and at 6am on the dot today.  Both nights she had a 7pm start to BT.  And her naps on both days 2 hours and the next day 1 and 3/4 hrs, and today it was 2hrs.  Is there any pattern do you think to why she managed to do 2 fairly good nights?

Today, I put her down at 7pm again, she was having the bottle by 7.07pm and asleep by 7.30pm.  See how she goes.

Also, I stopped her morning WU bottle of milk today...I had been making it less and less each morning until I thought I had better stop it all together because she was getting a bit grumpy straight after because it was finished and she wanted more...She was fine coming straight down to breakfast without any sign of the bottle but it did mean she had a breakfast at 6.45am!  Any thoughts on what you think about that?

Would be good to hear your thoughts.

[Martini~]

Hi Hon! Firstly big apologies that I was a bit absent for the last week. Had some issues at home, my mum was in the hospital and DS got some viral infection and his teeth are coming through! Messy and crazy week:).

Regarding your nights, I think that she is getting used to a new routine with one nap. Try to be consistent now and hopefully there will be more nights like that. I would also be very pushy about teaching her to find her dummy by herself so even if she had a bad night, she will be able to self sooth herself.

I don't know if I wrote it before but remember that it's almost not possible for children not to wake at night. It's normal and you also wake many times at night. The challenge is to make them to go back to sleep by themselves without your help. So don't concentrate on how many times she woke at night but take care on those times when she didn't self sooth herself and needed you.
In my house, DS can wake at night because of different reasons but he doesn't need my help to go back to sleep. If he does, I usually know it's discomfort which makes his sleep worse and I am helping him but try to do as little as possible.

Regarding your question on morning feed, I would encourage you to open a new thread as that way you will be able to get more valueable advice, as it was with soother weaning. To my knowledge, many many kids start the day with a bottle/sippy cup with milk and that's not a problem even for older kids (just make sure you changed bottle to sippy cup/beaker). It's also useful for mothers as milk is easy to be prepared:) and first hunger of your child is satisfied quickly:)!

HTH

[Canadian Nat]

Hello.  Sorry to hear about your problems at home...I hope things are better now...

Just as I thought, as you say, she was probably getting there but last night went wrong as she got disturbed by the 2 yr old who came down with a cold...Now baby has it too... So today's nap went wrong-she had to go nap early at 9.40am and she only slept an hour. ..she never slept again all day...What a failure things have been...I suppose I'll be up all night with a sick baby or OT baby...Or the 2 year old disturbs her....

How do you think I should handle an OT baby in the morning after a bad night's sleep?  An early nap? As you see, my early nap didn't work out as she never napped again today.  Is this because she's got used to one nap now? How should I handle it next time?

[Martini~]

Sorry to hear about sick baby Hon. Things are better here so I hope it will also get better for you soon!

Regarding your question, if the night was OT - I would just try to stick to your routine as much as you can. So try putting for a nap close to her usual time, don't let her catchup on night too much as it may backfire at next night. If the whole day went wrong and you have a baby who slept almost nothing I would probably go for very EBT as even if the night will be disturbed, altogether she may catch up.

With an EMW, I would allow nap in the morning but I would cap it at 15min probably and than put her to sleep again later. With an 1h first nap, it's difficult as she may be not interested in any nap until late afternoon when you are not interested in her napping!

Things are probably different with a sick baby as those puppets can sleep more/less more soundly/more unsettled and here I would just go with the flow.

HTH

[MasynSpencerElliotte]

Personally after a bad night I push to get the nap as close to normal time as possible by keeping things low key. We usually end up with pillows on the floor and a show on! For sickness it depends how bad it is as to what we might do for naps.

[Canadian Nat]

Thanks both of you. Yes, I get it about going with the flow with sick baby. I'm afraid I couldn't stretch her out this morning for her usual 11/11 30am nap. She really wanted to go to sleep.  So, again she went down (straight off!) at 9.40am...Last night she was up twice with the cold...

When she's better, and if she is really tired on a normal day and I put her down early, I'm still terrified of capping the nap at 15 mins...How do you do it? Just go and wake her? Doesn't it feel wrong to wake her after she's only just gone down? Just asking cause I'm going to feel awful when I have to do it! Do you think she'll want to nap still later in the afternoon?

[Canadian Nat]

Hello,  well today she napped for 1hrs and 10 mins.  Later at about 4pm she seemed tired and I thought she wouldn't survive if I didn't offer a nap so I tried.  At first she cried for me about 10 mins after putting her down. I went up and picked her up and settled her mood with a bit of looking out of the window and gentle talk.  I was surprised that she then went down. She never normally lets me leave her after I've gone in during a nap attempt.  So I thought I needed to do that catnap you've suggested. I woke her after 20 mins. However,  she was not happy...She was difficult and crying and grumpy for a good while after I got her up... She perked up during dinner and after. I just get the feeling waking her up was the wrong thing to do. Perhaps it was cause she is ill that she was so unhappy.  Maybe she needed the sleep?  However,  I agree that I wouldn't have wanted her to sleep long at that time of day with a nap already under her belt. What should I have done since she was ill but needed a bit of sleep  I just hated waking her up.I wouldn't have minded if she had been happy enough on WU but she wasn't...

Tonight she wasn't too bad to put down. I started earlier-she had bottle at just before 7pm. She fell asleep quite well on  her own with soother in cot. But she's still quit full of cold.

[MasynSpencerElliotte]

Some kids (and people, lol I am one of them!) just don't like being woken up no matter how long they slept!  Tbh I would have just snuggled in the room for the 15/20 and then gently woken up while in my arms...but that was the only way I got a catnap in the end. We have cold & ear infections right now, so our sleep is out the window too!