Two 1 hour naps, or one 2 hour nap?

[lottytheladybird]

My DS is approaching a year old. He used to always have two 1 hour naps during the day, one in the morning and one in the afternoon. However, it's becoming increasingly difficult to get him to nap in the afternoon these days. So we're experimenting with one 2 hour nap in the morning, but he does get really tired by tea time.

I just wanted to find out what sort of naps other babies of a similar age are having.

both mine had 1 nap at that age. To start with it was around 11am and they had a snack before it and lunch afterwards. We made it gradually later and later and it eventually ended up around 12.30pm which was after lunch.

I'd say take what you can get! Am 'blessed' with a 19mo who is of the firm belief that sleep is for the weak. Now at least he'll sleep 11 hours at night, but daytime kips are rarely longer than 40 minutes. Once a day. And it has been ever thus [tired]

He does seem to prefer to sleep in the afternoon rather than the morning though.

DD had two naps a day until she was about 18 months, then switched to one. She doesn't sleep more than 10 hours at night though, so really needs a good afternoon sleep.

DS swapped to one nap at about one, sleeping 12-2, whereas DD didn't swap to just one nap until 18 months. She's now 2.5 and generally, "No sleep Mummy!" whereas DS napped until nearly 4.

Dd is one next week and has 30 minutes in the morning and anywhere between 1 and 2 hours after lunch

IIRC only about 4% of children drop to 1 nap before 12 months. At 18 months it's something like 50% are on 1 nap and by 24 months, about 90% of them are. DS switched to 1 nap at 13 months, which was earlier than the other babies I know IRL.

Before that, his first nap was 30 mins and he'd sleep for 2 hours at the second, but I'd wake him sooner than that - eventually after just 45 mins. By the time he went to one nap, he wasn't going to sleep at night until about 9pm (he woke at 7am). When he went to one nap, he slept at 11am for 2 hours and I put him to bed at 6.30pm.

If she's tired in the afternoon, I'd stick with 2 naps for now as overtiredness (being awake for too long between sleeps) can stop them sleeping properly at night. You will probably need to move the afternoon nap later, and bedtime later too. When bedtime gets later than you can cope with, try one nap. When you do switch to just one nap, you'll need to move bedtime earlier to compensate.