A routine for a 6 months old who started to wake up early

[Tuty]

Hi all,
My DD is 6 months old and decided it's time to drop her third nap. She used to have an excellent routine of sleeping from 7AM to 7PM (with no feed, not even DF), napping at 9-ish, 1-ish and catnap (we worked really hard for months and lots of posts to get there!). In the past week she started waking up around 5/5:30, first she talks to herself than she cries. Her new day is as follows:

Either I feed her at 5:30-ish and 30 minutes later she'd go back to sleep for 45 minutes. Or we start her day at 5:30 (we're not built for PUPD and we can't ignore her). I'm really afraid the feeding may turn into a habbit, especially since I'm certain she doesn't need it, I'm the one to offer it and she doesn't eat much (she's hungry again at around 8-ish, breastfed).

She goes down for her first nap (1.5 hours) at around 8-9,depending on her actual wakeup time.
Her second nap around 1-ish (~1.5 hours, sometimes less)
Goes to bed at 6:30 (falls asleep on her own, sometimes I still hear her talking until 7).
She's both breast and formula fed (8oz) and eats cereal and peas.

With 3 naps and 7-7 she was sleeping at least 15 hours a day. Now she's hardly sleeping 13 hours so I'm quite certain she's not getting enough sleep.

Any suggestions on how to set up her daily routine to get her to wake up later?

Thanks,
Tuty

[Kimberly®]

All I could think of was that DD started doing this at about 6 months, right when her solids had really increased and she was hungry. For about a month she would wake up hungry and we gave her a half feed to get her through untill morning and untill we got the right balence of solids and milk agian.

[torontomamma]

The same thing is happening with my DD, and started around 5.5-6mos.  I am still trying to sort it out!

I am dropping the catnap, but it's hard when she wakes up so early.  I heard that it happens when they need to move some of their day sleep to night sleep - ie shorter naps, less naps and more A time - I am currently trying to extend to 2.75 - 3 hrs.

Just wanted to wish you the best, by looking at the other posts we are definatley not alone!

Jaime

[Tuty]

Thanks all for your response.
First of all, I'm not worried about her eating habbits. She's definitely eating enough (4-5 milk feedings of 8oz - when not bf, and cereal and peas twice a day).
Last night she fell asleep at 6:45PM. Today she woke up at 5:30AM, she called us at 5:50 at which time I fed her and tried to put her back to sleep, but she refused, I left her to play alone in her crib until 6:45.
Her first nap was 8:10-9:30 (I couldn't keep her longer than that) and now she's having her second nap (12:10). So she must have a third nap today, or she'd be way overtired by 6PM.
Could it be related to crawling? she keeps pulling her butt up and travelling around the crib.
Lately, for all her naps, I turn on the music, give her the paci and then she pulls her head up and looks around. I have to go out and let her call me back in, when I go back in, I give her the paci again and pat a little on her back, if she pulls her head up, I walk out again. If she doesn't settle the second time. I let her fuss for about a minute, then usually I'd go in pat on her back, give her the paci and she'd close her eyes and then go to sleep on her own. It no longer works in the afternoon (could take 40 mins of trying by which time it's either too late, or we give up). I'm afraid it may stop working for the other naps too. Any suggestions (maybe I should post this in the naps forum..).
Thanks,
Tuty