Do I compensate for short naps?

[Liam and Shane's Mommy]

My ds is almost 6 mos. and I finally got away from accidental parenting and now put him down awake which has worked better than I expected except for the length of his naps.  I rather hoped once he learned to self-soothe he'd sleep longer.  ( he doesn't wake happy from the short naps)  I've been trying for the past couple of weeks and was wondering.  If for eg. I'm unsuccessful in extending his morning nap and I give up after 40 minutes or so, do I then put him down soon after his next meal or wait until whatever time would have been his afternoon nap had he slept longer?  The stuff I've read in Tracy's books is conflicting.  On one hand it says put them down soon after feed so as to avoid overtiredness but then when she discusses transitioning to the 4 hour EASY she says keep them up to keep them on schedule.

Also my ds gets overtired and overstimulated very easily.

[Aarismom]

Keep him up to within a half hour or so of his next nap, then put him down It's best to stick with a schedule after 4 months, as it's a lot easier for them to adjust to it.

6 months...that's what mine is. I'm now dealing with transitioning to 2 naps. Lemme tell ya, it's no picnic. I hope when you do it it goes smoother for you!!

*HUGS*
Sonya =P

[GG]

Feed him and let him have his activity time.  If he gets tired sooner, then start the wind down and see if he falls asleep earlier.  Waiting 'til it's time for his next nap (and therefore getting an overtired child to sleep) is much harder than just adding an extra nap in the afternoon if he needs it.  It took me a while to transition from 3-hour to 4-hour EASY because of the short naps.  Some days he was fine with 3 naps, other days he ended up with 5 short naps because he just couldn't stay asleep.

The most important thing Tracy emphasized about EASY was that it should be a routine, not necessarily a schedule.  Think of it this way: if you had a long day, wouldn't you prefer to get to bed an hour earlier rather than wait to your 'normal' bedtime just for the sake of a schedule?

[mommytsa]

For my LO and his consistently short naps and tendency to get overtired, what I try to do is base his next nap on his wake time.  It gets a little wonky with the feeds, since he could easily do four hours between feeds.  Basically, I try and mesh things so that he goes 4 hours between feeds and has 2 hours of A time between each nap.  It's kind of a crazy EASAEASAEAS So his day might look something like this:

7 up for the day, E
7:15 A
9 S (45 min)
9:45 A
11 E
11:15 A
11:45 S (45 min)
12:30 A
2:30  S (45 min)
3:15 E
3:30 A
5:15 S (though sometimes he skips this nap entirely)
6 A (bath around 6:30-6:45)
7 (or so) E then 15 min of bedtime routine
7:30 bed

It's not really EASY, but it applies some of the same principles.  I found that I have to be a stickler about 2 hours of awake time, otherwise he will scream and fight and cry and refuse to nap entirely, just because.  Recently, he's been extending a nap and droppign that 4th catnap, so that's been nice.  I hope this made some sense and helps a little.