Help! routine for DS2 sabotaged by DS1! (only 14mths apart)

[mrsmcgeever]

My eldest son is 17mths old and my youngest is 3mths. I'm having a nightmare getting the little one to have enough naps during the day as everytime I try and put him down DS1 charges around waking him up. He's only young so of course he doesn't understand being quiet. I've tried getting him set up with toys etc to keep him occupied but he always ends up wandering in. DS2 is only having 40 min naps when i do manage to get him to sleep and so by the afternoon he's really cranky. Does anyone else have kids this close together? Could you get the second child into a routine? Or do they just end up learning to adapt and falling asleep on their own??? Help!

mine were 17 months apart so slightly older but for ds2 he has a dummy so he could go down very quickly/easily for naps so i would just put him in his cot with it and he put himself to sleep and then i just come straight out that way its very quick ds1 doesn't follow in, otherwise if he came in would make it quite difficult to get the baby to sleep
i think when ds2 was very young i used to just let him sleep anywhere though, used to use the vibrating bouncer thing a lot as it would put him to sleep and would let him do that in the living room with the background noise of ds1.
other options would be if you carried him in a sling if he would sleep there? (i see a lot of people doing this but not done it alot myself) or if they sleep while in the buggy?
my ds2 has much less of a strict routine than ds1 though i dont get him to sleep at set times just whenever is convenient for everyone really, and sometimes he just has to fall asleep on me when we are out. whereas ds1 i used to be like he has to sleep at 10am, 1pm etc much more specific

oh poor you. there is 13months between ds and dd2 and i can barely remember most of their first 2 years to be honest - all a bit of a blur!

i was lucky in that they seemed to kinda fall into a routine together and would usually sleep at the same time. i would let dd2 sleep pretty much anywhere i could and she did become very used to background noise (tv,toys,music etc). i did find that if she went to sleep with some noise then it was less likely to disturb her once she was asleep. hang in there, i promise it will get easier

sorry that sounded a bit patronising - didnt mean it to! just remember how bloody hard it was and breathing big sigh of relief that they are now 7,8,11

Thanks for your messages! I know it will get easier as they get older - less naps and feeding for the little one and eventually they'll be playing together. My first had a good routine and is a really good sleeper so I have this feeling that if I don't get DS2 into the routine as well, we'll never get a full nights sleep!