Why won't my 2.5 year go to sleep!

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My DS has always been a good sleeper. Since he has been talking he has developed a habit of having a natter and a sing song in bed before going to sleep. Fair enough! This would often go on for 30 minutes. Recently it's got way longer chatting away, kicking about, singing etc for up to an hour and a half. Meaning he wouldn't sleep til about 9.30.

So I was fairly convinced he no longer needed as long a nap during the day anymore (usually 1hour). However, today he didn't take his nap for the first time ever. I put him in bed as usual at nap time and he chatted for an hour and then we got him out. As you would imagine he was clearly tired at bedtime being the first time he's ever stayed awake all day. I was sure he'd lie his head down and go straight off. Wrong!!!! He has now been chatting etc for 30 minutes with no signs of calming down. Both DH and I have been in to try and calm him but nothing is working. He is happy in there but surely he needs to sleep!

Anyone know what's going on here as I just don't get it and it really is stressing me out!?

My daughter is doing this. I sang for 45minutes tonight :( She used to just go down with a quick song and a "night nihgt".

BeatriceBean how old is she and does she nap?

I think they just go through phases of it. My DS is five and has been through a few. Just leave him to it if he's happy on his own! :)

My dd started doing this a few months back (she's recently turned 2), she could sometimes take 1.5 hours to go to sleep. But my view is, so long as they're happy and not crying out, just leave them to it. If you keep going in, you might be stimulating him more and making it less likely that he'll nod off.
They have do much going on in their little heads, sometimes it just takes them a while to switch off. We had thought maybe dd was ready to drop her nap, but she really wasn't. We put her down a bit later (8 instead of 7/7.30) and sometimes she'll go off quite quickly, other times like tonight she'll chat for ages. But if she's happy then I'm happy!

I can't leave mine to it as they share a room, even if I didn't mind leaving them crying!

It's 40minutes since I put her down and she's alternating "mummy sing" with "look at xyz"...

She does still nap (45mins roughly). She's 2.5 and I tried to stop them to see if it would help but she just gets grumpy in the afternoon and falls asleep on the sofa about 4/5ish !!

She's up between 5 and 6am...

My dd2 is nearly 2.5 and the same. She can make it through without a nap some days and then on others is either falling asleep before lunch or crashing out at 4/5pm and then waking up again.

I think the light evenings don't help. New tactic is for DH to take her for a walk after dinner to tire her out.