Good morning everyone!
My 4.5 month old has been a pretty easy and sweet baby since birth! He's been a decent sleeper as well, and has been able to go to sleep independently for awhile- usually fusses and moves around and then falls asleep. I'm struggling right now with figuring out his A time before bed, and how to nail the right bedtime after his last nap!
As many 4-5 month olds are, his schedule can be somewhat unpredictable- sometimes he takes long chunky naps, and some days they are 45 mins- 1 hr. So it's hard to write out a standard "EASY", but here's what the past couple days have looked like.
*Note: He sleeps swaddled, in his crib, he does use a paci but doesn't require it to fall asleep, and he is EBF
Thursday:
645a: WU
8-1030: S
1030: E
1215: E
12:40-4:10: S (He did wake up around 1:30, I was able to hold him and get him back to sleep)
6:00- Bathtime/bedtime routine/BF
6:30: Asleep
-->NW: 830/945/145/430
Wednesday:
7:15a: WU
8:00: E (isn't very into BF when he first wakes up for some reason)
8:45: E again because he barely ate at 8
9-1030: S
11:15: E
12-12:30: S in carseat (I have a toddler in school and have to pick her up)
1:45: E
2-3: S
3:30: E
4:30: E
4:45-5:45: S
6:00: E
7:00: Bathtime/Bedtime routine/BF
7:30: S
-->NW: 930/1/545
*Questions
1) 2 naps don't seem like enough- my daughter wasn't on 2 naps until around 9 months! But when naps are long, not sure how to fit it all in. My biggest issue/question is that when he wakes up from a nap at or after 4pm, should I try to get him to nap again around 530/545, hoping for just a quick 30 min cat nap, and then put him to bed 2 hrs after that? Or should I just not try to get him to nap again and put him to bed around 6/630? Because I also have a toddler, that 530 nap can be hard to nail between dinner/cooking/meltdowns/etc- but I am willing to try if you think this would help.
2) Dream Feed- I've been doing a DF with him since we put him in his crib at 9 weeks. I used to just sneak in at 10 ish and feed and put him back in. The past couple weeks, however, as he's been going down to sleep closer to 630, he's been waking up for a feed anywhere between 9-10. Sometimes I try to catch him before he wakes up- IE if he hasn't woken up by 930p then I do the DF then. However he is still waking to eat somewhere between 12-2 and then again 5-6. Do I cut the DF? adjust it somehow?
3) He's not rolling back to belly yet but seems very close- so I preemptively want to try to transition into Merlin suit- will try for naps first but wondering if this could be causing NW? He moves around (scooches) a ton while swaddled, lifts and slams his legs down, etc...
Thanks in advance for all the help!