Naps all over the place

[Carmela's Mom]

Just when night time goes well, naps become the problem.  It is so hit and miss right now with Carmela.  She's 19 months old.  I put her in at 12:30...now yesterday she went in at 11:45 because she just couldn't stay awake any longer.  Today it's 1:15 and she's still playing in her crib.  Anyone else have a child that has no clue what time they want to nap?  How do you do it?  do you put them in at the same time and just deal with a missed nap? Or do you put them in with the sleepy cues (which I must say are SO hard to read at this age).  Right now this is our schedule (on most days unless we get a 11:30 nap on somedays) since everytime I post a question someone asks

6:30-7:15 wake up (never consistent)
11:30 lunch
12:00 milk (which I am cutting out to give after nap after today)
12:15 begin naptime routine
12:30 in crib
wake up depends what time she finally goes to sleep usually about 1.5-2 hours later
5:30 dinner
6:00 bath
7:30 bedtime (sometimes earlier if bad nap)

Suggestions?

[Carmela's Mom]

ANYONE have advice?  One whole week of this and I'm drained!

[dbymom]

We have a similar problem but night wakings as well! I wrote in "1 nap and night waking". It is exhausting...Cassidy will be in her crib for up to 2 hours playing before she takes a nap, if she falls asleep at all. Soemtimes we get lucky and she goes to sleep right away but we have no idea why. Recently we've had a couple days with no nap, she'll crash super early at night and then wake up for 2 hours in the middle of the night playing. I'm sorry I have no advice for you but I feel your pain! I have no idea what she wants to do and she looks tired all the time. Any help I'd appreciate too!

[Carmela's Mom]

What helped me at this point was to just be consistent.  I set a nap time and that was that.  If she woke early, she still went in at 12:30 and if she woke late, she went in at 12:30.  It worked for about two weeks I want to say and now we have one day a week where she is not wanting to nap.  I am hoping today she goes in well since she didn't get as good as sleep last night.  It seems to come in phases with my daughter (and others on the board too)...she'll do great for two weeks, then awful for two weeks....not sure why.