at 8 mo you could try sticking to set nap times so that even if he wakes early he goes down within 10 min or so of his usual nap times. by 8 mo many lo have established a rhythm for their naps if they ahve stuck close enough to these times for a while. so if FOR EXAMPLE he usually naps around 9 and 1pm and one morning he wakes at 6 instead of 6:30 he might be fine coping with the extra A time (and i suggest keeping the extra 1/2 hr more low key than usual). this way he does not get left with a huge A time at the end of the day if he is not ready for it, but rather you spread that extra A time into his day.
an example of how set they can get comes from Liv last month - she usually naps around 9:30 and 1:30 and went to daycare in the mornig and took forever to go down for her nap and ended up sleeping from 10:15-11:45 :shock: as i had never had to instruct them before with a wake up time. so i was worried she woudl never go down for an afternoon nap. well, by 1:30 i could tell she would get to bed soon as she was already acting like she shoudl be in bed (ingrained in her biorhythm by now) and i quickly started getting her ready and got her to bed at 1:45 and she was fast asleep in 10 min with no fuss. I thought for sure she would not go down until closer to 3pm...
