Do all babies start taking 45 min naps at 3-4 months?!?!

[KellyC]

Hi there

It sounds like your LO goes to sleep so well - when Zander started 45 minute napping I was also having to spend the first 20 minutes of his sleep with him to stop him waking up and that was once I got him to sleep in the first place, it was really tough.  You should be proud    I personally wouldn't change your wind-down if she only needs a short one and goes to sleep fine.

If she's feeding well after 3 hours then you might want to stick with it for a while longer, though perhaps don't worry so much if she's still sleeping after 3 hours and you want to stretch the odd feed to 3.5 hours.

A really effective thing to do with blackout material is to velcro it to the window frame and that way absolutely no light gets into the room (from the window anyway - it always came through from around our door frame!).

Good luck and have a good weekend
Kelly x

[nursekat]

Yes, I'm very thankful she goes to sleep so easily - I have a bad back so standing at her crib for long periods of time starts to get to me.

Oooh, velcro - that's a great idea!  I was trying to think how I was going to hang them under her regular blinds - that's perfect, thank you!  Did you find any fabrics that work best?

so far today easase is working!  Keep your fingers crossed!

-Kathleen

[KellyC]

Hi Kathleen - glad to know your name!  I bought just regular blackout fabric, actually it came as a kit with the velcro but I have absolutely no practical skills and made a bit of a mess of it.  It still worked though!

Good luck with today
Kelly x

[nursekat]

I just wanted to report that my LO is doing better...still waking at 45mins, but we're getting better at getting her back to sleep.  The blackout curtains were a HUGE help - she even started sleeping in an hour later in the morning!  Her room is usually bright as it faces east.  Sometimes when she wakes at 45 mins, I just go and play with her in her crib for another 15-20mins (the time I'm usually "fighting" with her to get her back to sleep), and then put her down with minimal resistance.  Sometimes she's groggy enough in her super-dark room that just reinserting her binkie and a little pressure gets her back down.  I highly recommend the blackout curtains!  I want to go back and yell at the fabric store lady - she asked my DH what he was buying the fabric for, and he told her, and she said, "Oh that won't work" very curtly and left it at that.  I just want to say NYAH!   
 
Anyway, I worked on extending her A time and really had trouble with that - she is just sooo tired after an hour that even when I tried to extend it slowly, she was really struggling.  So I'm just putting her down after an hour, then she spends anywhere from 15-30 minutes between her two 45 min naps (EASASE), and it seems to work much better for her.

[nursekat]

Ok, I spoke too soon.  She napped horribly yesterday, and we couldn't get her to bed at night from between 7:30 to 10:30pm - props or no props!  Ouch.  I just am not convinced the extension of her A time is the answer - she gets tired after an hour of being awake.  Now that I've worked on getting her A times longer than an hour, she's just exhausted by the end of the day!  She gets so tired that each nap gets progressively harder to get her down.  I'm going to try going back to just reading her cues, and doing a little easase maybe.  I dunno.  <sigh>  This is such a frustrating time.