Pleeeeease share your 4 month baby routines!!!

[RoxHarl]

Really hoping getting some insights from other mums may help me develop a routine that will work for my darlin little baby girl. who is just turning 4 months ad is our first baby (with the exception of our dog:) )

Up until she was 3 months we have just been going with the flow, but keeping a good bedtime routine, and things seemed to be falling into place. During the day we would play when she seemed to want to and I would let her nap in my arms or the sling when she wanted to, sometimes I would transfer her to her moses basket when she was asleep. At night our bedtime routine starts at 6 and she was usually asleep by 7. I breastfeed so we could be up 3/4 times during the night for feeds - but all seemed to be going in the right direction.

As of about a month now she has been having massive meltdowns almost daily, I strongly feel they are related to being overtired and am keen to introduce a more solid nap routine during the day to help with this. When she has her meltdowns she is inconsolable and nothing I do seems to help her - I hate to see her like this:(

As well as this, for a week or so we have been dealing with some meltdowns during the night and generally very restless -it seems to be in line with the 4 month sleep regression so I am hoping this side of things will pass.

Can I please ask anyone who has a rough routine/schedule;e that seems to be working for their 4 month old baby to share:) I know all babies are different and some are perhaps more 'laid back' then mine, but it's just to give me an idea of what could work.

Really big thank you!

Hey, I have twins who are 6 months old here’s their routine when they were 4 months
7am wake up & feed
Play time
9am nap - they’d wake up after 30mins exactly, they nap in their pram as this is the only way I can get them to sleep at the same time so I’d spend 5-10mins rocking them back to sleep again and they’d sleep for another 30-45mins .
11am feed
Playtime
1pm nap for 45-60mins
Playtime or go for a walk
3pm feed
3.30/4pm nap for 30-60mins
5.30pm I let them watch nursery rhymes on YouTube for half an hour as this is when they start getting grouchy
6pm naked/nappy free time on their changing mats
6.15pm bath
6.40pm feed
7pm bed

I never let them nap past 5pm. They feed around every 4 hours and don’t wake in the night.

They’re now 6.5 months and have two 2 hour solid naps 9.30-11.30 and 1.30/2 until 3.30/4 and I don’t let them nap past 4pm.

Hope that helps :-)

Thanks so much for this reply! Having twins must be fun!

Can I ask whether they were happy to go into their cot for any of their naps or was it more so in the pram?

Thanks!

takingcarababies.com/nap-schedules/

Have you looked at this website, I've used it a lot to refer to with our 2nd

I haven’t really tried them having naps in their cot. I tried once and it was a disaster, one waking the other up, and not being able to carry them upstairs at the same time etc.

Hi OP - I had a flick back at the app I used for DS (still got it now as thought it be handy to remember what babies were like when we have the next!).

Having a look at DS' logs it looked like we had an established routine for naps and feeding (I was combi feeding).

Day time Nap/Feed routine:
8am: wake up
9am: first feed
10am: first nap for 30 minutes
11.30am: second feed
12pm: second nap for 1.5 hours
2pm: third feed
4pm: third nap for 30 minutes
5pm: fourth feed
7pm: fifth feed
8pm: bed time

As for night time, DS appears to have woken twice during the night at around 2am and then 4am. We always done it so DH would do one feed then I'll do the other.

By 5 months it seems that we managed to space out DS' feeds and I can see that he then only woke once during the night at around 3am.

My DS is the absolute opposite of a laid back baby, and the exact same thing happened to us around the 3 month mark (now 4 months) - he became more and more hysterical due to overtiredness. I've been militant about napping and have got into a much better routine recently. Before he would barely nap, and if he did it would be in the pram or when rocked manically (and still would only sleep for 20mins). Our routine is based on awake times, which at four months should really only be around 1hr15 to 1hr30. So he wakes around 6:30, has his feed and goes back to sleep around 7:45. He usually sleeps between 35-40 mins per nap throughout the day which isn't ideal but we usually get 4 or 5 naps which helps with his overtiredness. I just get my stopwatch going as soon as he wakes and once we get to around an hour-ish awake i start his next nap routine. It's monotonous and driving me a bit mad, but his mood has improved SO much. He is still loves a meltdown now and again, but it's nothing like before. We then start bed time routine at 5:30, and he goes to sleep at 6:30. Usually wakes twice in the night for a feed. I've also been really trying to focus on self settling and over the last month that has improved a lot too. I'd say 2-3 of his naps he self settles and he always self settles for bed too. I hope you manage to get in a routine and make things a bit easier for yourself. First couple of weeks were a chore but I'm starting to see the benefits now and its easier.

Sounds like classic 4 month sleep regression? It hits some worse than others I’m told. I’m not sure any routine helps, they just need to learn to sleep differently.
I’d stick with what you were doing and wait it out until it passes.
I’m dreading it, currently have a brilliant sleeper as long as we bed share! But we are not quite 3 months.

Hahah routine. definitely didn't have one at 4 months, which coincidentally is a likely time for a 'sleep regression.' Some people thrive off routine and if that's you I hope you find a more helpful answer than mine, I'm just here to say it's okay not to have one. My kids have a routine now, and their napping needs became apparent later but I preferred feeding and napping on demand and not putting too much pressure on either of you. There's plenty of time for that later, and contrary to popular belief, you can't spoil a baby. You can feed to sleep and rock them, cosleep and play pink noise and it won't prevent them from going to bed happily and independently when they're older. Good luck

Try a snoozeshade on the buggy - they're great for encouraging naps. I put mine down every two hours (from when he woke up) and that worked pretty well x

We had zero routine at 4 months, just completely baby led. She would only nap 30 mins 4 times a day then bed around 9/10pm.
Now she is 13 months and we have a routine you could set your watch by, it just happens slowly. I get that a routine helps the sanity tho, if it helps have a routine like what baby groups you go to, go swimming on the same day etc. But if you want a daily routine too that’s fine as well. I just didn’t fancy it since I was so confused back then (much less confused now 😊).

DD is 5 months and we’ve been gradually getting into a nap/bedtime routine since she was 4 months (with varying success). Prior to that she would just nap whenever and wherever but became much much irritable as you describe (I put it down to not being able to nap just anywhere anymore and getting overtired as a result.

We don’t have a strict schedule as I like her to be somewhat flexible around whatever we are doing that day. I basically just put her down for a nap around 2 hours after she has been awake. She usually has 3 naps a day of varying lengths (anything from 30 mins to 2.5 hours), I usually let her nap as long as she wants and only wake her if we really need to leave the house.

She wakes up usually somewhere around 6:30-7:00am; nap 1 around 9:00am; nap 2 around 12:00pm; nap 3 around 3pm; bedtime around 7pm after bath, book and feed.

I find I need to look out for early tired cues and get her down fairly quickly (or at least remove all stimulation) so she doesn’t become hysterical. Look out for moaning, rubbing eyes, general erratic movements. She will sleep in pram or car seat (moving) or her cot usually so I just try to factor in one of these options when we are getting around nap time.

I think avoiding meltdowns is sometimes about letting the idea of a fixed routine go. This is a bit of a tricky stage, where they're no longer a newborn who sleeps most of the time, but haven't quite settled into a recognisable pattern. Generally getting into a total meltdown was a sign of overtiredness for my DC.

Currently my 6mo (DC 3) has either 3 or 4 naps a day, depending when they are and how long they are. In an ideal world she'd have a shortish morning nap (around 9), a longer after lunch nap (1ish) and another short nap (4ish), but very few days actually follow that pattern as there's always other stuff going on.

For example today she just didn't sleep after the school run (no apparent reason), then had a really long sleep around 12 because I had to go into town and she was in the buggy for ages, then no sleep until 5 as older DC had friends round after school and there was lots of coming and going, then she woke up far too early, a final nap at 7 ended when she pooed everywhere (otherwise that might have been bedtime) and then she finally crashed around 9.

I tend to be fairly relaxed about everything going all over the place, but recognise times when a sleep needs to happen.

Just realized there were lots more replies! Thank you all so much - really appreciate it! Unfortunately, the meltdowns are continuing at the moment, I have been trying to have one hour of play and then start to wind down and look out for any sleepy cues at all but even if I spot them they are followed by hysterical crying.... It seems that she does not like to sleep and hates even the feeling that she is starting to get tired.... Really hoping it's a phase that will pass!