To think that 1pm parties for 2yo are just wrong

[sometimesalways]

Ok I suspect this will prove controversial but I am genuinely at a loss here.

DS soon turns 2.5yo. He sleeps reasonably well, that is about 11 hours every night (7.30-6.30 or so) and 1.5hr on average for naps (usually 1-2.30). I thought this was pretty much the norm for his age group. I know he will drop the nap soon but he still does need it for now and he certainly did six months ago.

So the thing is we are often being invited to parties (a wonderful thing in itself of course!), for kids around his age and younger, which start at 1pm. Of course I always want to go as he has fun etc but how on earth do I fit the nap there? If I put him down earlier, it's too early and he won't fall asleep. If I try keeping him up, he just goes crazy as too tired to last till bedtime.

But my main question is, what routine do the parents who set the party at that time follow to make it work?? It seems to be happening a lot so I am starting to think that our nap might be the unusual one? I am genuinely asking as I don't understand and I don't want to ask them - don't want to seem ungrateful or rude as it's all people I like. I am just wondering what am I doing wrong

Does your 2.5yo do naps and when?

SoyDora I'm not criticising your choices so not sure why you feel the need to defend them. I have two DCs so yes I'm aware you have to balance between their individual needs as much as possible.

My oldest is a psychopath when tired, I know that's unusual, but it's not because I don't want to be flexible or I'm a slave to routine. It's because my child needs rest/downtime. I feel like there's a hint of "well if you can't take your 2 year old to a party at 1 PM you're just too rigid" in some of these comments.

I always get confused about this, I'm living abroad and we have a little expat meet up page thingy. Occasionally when suggesting an activity involving children people start going barmy about nap times and when things are organised etc as though there is some kind of universal nap schedule that everyone is on and I should obviously know what that is since I have two children - but I don't, sorry! DS1 never used to sleep in the afternoon, it had to be morning, 11ish after playgroup, I don't remember when he stopped but definitely by 3yo, and DS2 doesn't have set in stone naps either, they are easily movable and flexible around whatever we have planned. Another reason I never understand the drive to get children to nap in a cot/bed - why? Then you're just stuck in the house!

Particularly Americans seem to expect their children to nap until about 4 or 5 years old, whereas I don't know any British child who naps by the age of 3, and yes most would have stopped by 2.5.

I was only defending my choices in the way that you’re defending yours edgeofheaven. If you felt there was a hint of ‘well if you can't take your 2 year old to a party at 1 PM you're just too rigid’,l in my comments, then maybe I felt there was a hint of ‘if one of your children needs a nap and you prioritise the needs of another child over that then you’re a bad parent’ to yours. But it’s all irrelevant anyway! If we had an invitation to a party at a time that didn’t suit us, we wouldn’t go.

Bertie, Im with you! I never saw the attraction of having to sleep at home in a bed.
However some parenting books suggest you instil A Routine from a young age so by the time they're 2 its all they know and its hard to change. We didnt go down the Fixed Routine route as I wanted to meet different friends at different times and go to different groups etc. Often we went out for the day to a farm/etc so baby would nap in a sling/buggy. It would have been really difficult to go and visit family or go out for the day if we'd have had to be home by a bed for 2 hours a day...

@SoyDora completely get it and you are right. I imagine everyone will have to adapt to different routines if I have a second DC for example. I am still on my first so have a relative freedom in working out the schedule that suits him best.

@LaMarschallin indeed I am trying to do what is best for my DS as we all are... DS was a terrible sleeper in the first months of his life and we all suffered very much from lack of sleep, it was a very difficult time. This has made me quite sensitive to matters of sleep I guess. I don't mind being at home for him to sleep - I use the time to catch up with work or do chores around the house. But that is beyond the point. DS is a very very energetic kid so exhausted himself often and I genuinely think he still needs his nap in order to be healthy and happy

@sometimesalways yours sounds like my oldest. Extremely active with loads of energy, needs to recharge a bit after lunch to keep it going until bedtime. You can find a way to manage with two DCs if you have to. Do what's right for you now. Every child and every family is different.

My daughter's 2nd birthday party is planned for 1 o'clock. She doesn't nap during the day, hasn't for about a year so I just didn't think

@TiredTodayZzzz well as earlier replies show, many children don't sleep at that time so I think you're ok

@sometimesalways

indeed I am trying to do what is best for my DS as we all are... DS was a terrible sleeper in the first months of his life and we all suffered very much from lack of sleep, it was a very difficult time. This has made me quite sensitive to matters of sleep I guess. I don't mind being at home for him to sleep - I use the time to catch up with work or do chores around the house. But that is beyond the point. DS is a very very energetic kid so exhausted himself often and I genuinely think he still needs his nap in order to be healthy and happy,

In which case, you're obviously nothing like that person I had in mind. Just try not to fret. If he needs a nap, and missing it would trigger Armageddon, well, skip those parties that take place during the vital times. Other people may have equally necessary but different regimes.
Like worries about potty training and speech and walking, in the absence of pathology, in years to come they'll all be continent, be able to use language, will walk and won't turn down parties that sound like fun because they need a nap.

Unless they're that person I know. Who needs her sleep. But she's happy not going to parties.
And her son with the routine? Now 26 and a party animal!

@edgeofheaven his endless energy is why we haven't dared to attempt a second one yet! But I think the time is approaching

Mine stopped napping just around 2 years old- and to be fair he was inconsistent before then. Bedtimes were a nightmare when he napped and now they are a breeze so even though I miss the quiet time during the day, our lives are overall improved.

By the time my DS was 2.5 naps were a distant memory for us. He'd sleep from 9pm to 8am, have a drink of milk and go back to sleep until about 10. So I guess you could say he napped from 8.10am to 10am. I had been devastated when he quit napping a couple of days before he turned 2 (on the day of his party, which I'd timed for after the nap he never ended up having). But he fell into what really was a superb sleep schedule leaving us free to be out and about from mid-morning until late into the evening and I had plenty of me-time for 3 hours at night and 2 in the morning. So dropping naps was an extremely positive thing.

I'm pretty sure that almost every parent of a healthy toddler since the dawn of time is under the impression that theirs is uniquely active and energetic, along with being especially cute...

But lots of people only have one child, or one child when they have a 2 year old. And I put my child’s need to have a nap over any problem I might have with being ‘housebound’ as you call it. In fact, I got loads of things done in that 2 hour period and was initially horrified when she dropped it!

This thread shows that it’s a real mixture and hence proves the point that having a party at 1pm for 2 year olds is a daft idea —moreso than having a party for 2 year olds at all—.

Completely agree OP. I know all kids are different but mine and most other kids I know were having a nap after lunch even at 2.5 yo. 1pm is a weird time. Why not make it 10.30?

Lots of people seem to find it hard having to be in their home for a chunk of time during the day while a younger one has a nap, this isnt something i really struggle with. we are up and out early, so have usually been already done lots, we get home and lunch takes up half an hour til half 12, then it's only an hour and half. Kids can just play with toys at home.... Or we do painting or baking or play out in the garden. The only thing it restricts is me doing things like going for lunch with friends at an adult time, which I prefer not to do with very young children anyway, I just see my friends for dinner in the evening instead....

My first dc slept in the afternoon until he was 3 1/2. Really needed it and still slept 12 hours at night. I never believed people who said their one year olds didn’t need a nap.

Enter dc2 and 3 who dropped their nap at around 15 months.

As others have said, when you have older dc too you can’t really come home in the middle of the day for baby to nap so dc 2 and 3 napped on the go, in pushchair.

I don’t know if that made any difference to dropping the nap early. I suspect not as dc1 just couldn’t have managed without.

Bertie. My DS will nap in a pram, but only cat nap. Most people I knew found that in a cot, their child would have one longer sleep, during which they could get a few jobs done, child would wake up happy and last easily til bedtime. If we did pram naps, he would do a 20 or 30 min doze, it was never long enough and within a couple of hours he would be grumpy, tantrummy etc. Followed by an overtired bed time. I LOVE a good cot nap

Do people seriously go out with children all day, every day, and never come home for lunch? I can't think of anything worse!

There is never going to be a time to suit everyone. People with 1 child might stick to an at home nap. People with older kids might have commitments with them during party time some might work. Some kids decide on that day to change nap time Some kids settle anywhere. Some kids scream blue murder if woken and it disrupts their sleep pattern for the following week. Thete are so many different things going on in different family's that no one time for a party will suit everyone. The rest of the world dosent stop because it's ltitle Tommy nap time 😂 if the error time dosent suit you then don't go just don't expect everyone else to work around your kids routinetc.

Yeah fair enough if it's the only place they'll do a decent nap, I was saying I don't get why people want to do it, not why people do it! I have always found the opposite with my DC though - pushchair/car/lap naps last for longer and bed ones tend to be short unless I lie there with them the whole time.

I don't go out every day no but as I don't drive it tends to be about a 3-4 hour operation all in, to go to a group or meet friends etc. So it either takes up the whole morning or the whole afternoon, and sometimes we want to do more than one thing in a day. It's nice to go out as a family at the weekend as well, with lunch? Not every weekend but sometimes. It's more the freedom to go out than actually doing it. Also DS2 still has two naps so it would pretty much mean being stuck in for the entire day if he had to have both of them at home.

This was a huge problem for us. We just didn’t go. Surely a mid afternoon nap is common. But even if it isn’t, mid afternoon is a time when most kids get tired and need quiet time.

1pm isn't mid afternoon though. 3pm is, ideal finish time to go home and do something quiet...

Mine were up at 5am at that age and napped from about 11am-12:30 when they napped. They'd all stopped needing naps by 2.5 though.

I always wished toddlers groups ran from 8:45-10:45 actually we did have a baby group which started at that time for a while, set up in a room attached to the preschool - all younger siblings it stopped running after a year as the room was too small for a proper toddlers group though, and people with dc2,3 or 4 usually need the groups less anyway.

It always used to confuse me when arranging a meet up with another family that they would specify timings based on their baby's nap time.

We also had a baby and I think everyone just assumed that our baby's nap time would be at the same time.

My DS would nap from 2 - 3:30 every day right up until he started school ( he sometimes fell asleep at school when he first started reception)

DD always napped for an hour at 10am and then had a 30 min nap in her buggy at 3pm.

If we had an invitation to something that crossed over the DC's normal nap time we just went anyway.

I’m a sleep consultant and it’s totally normal for some children to still nap at 2.5, even 3. If they need it definitely don’t ditch it, hang onto it for as long as you can!