1 nap- lunch before or after nap???

[DC1stTimeMummy]

Hello, I wanted to ask the following about my 15 month old toddler. It has been around 3 weeks since he has transitioned to 1 nap a day.

Currently he has the following:

• 4-6am wake* this can vary on each day & at times he won’t resettle & will stay awake
• 6:30am milk
• 8am breakfast
• 9:30am fruit snack
• 11:30am lunch
• 12-2pm nap (aim for 2 hours)
• 2:30pm snack
• 5pm dinner
• 6:30pm milk & bed 7/7:30pm

I’m finding come lunchtime my toddler is over tired & not interested in his food (mainly due to waking too early on that day). He will go straight to sleep for his nap at 12. I want him to eat his lunch but not sure what to do. Should I change the timing of it?

I’ve had a look & I have come up with 2 options:

1. Give lunch earlier around 11am & then either nap at 12 or earlier at 11:30am? Then give a larger snack when he wakes up from the nap? So half lunch before his nap & the other half after his nap?

1. Or give the nap first at 11:30am-1:30pm & then lunch after? Maybe give a snack before he has his nap so he isn’t hungry when sleeping?

Would I keep everything else the same, so dinner still at 5pm?

Hope to hear back from parents who have experienced the same as me!

Nap at 11.30-1.30 then lunch for us here and it's always worked well.

We did snack at 10:30, nap 11:30-1:30 and lunch ready when they woke up for both DC. Then another snack at 3:30 and dinner at 5:30. When the nap stopped we moved lunch to between 12 and 12:30.

My DC always woke/wake at 7:30am though, so our mornings were a bit shorter!

We do breakfast, snack (can be reasonably substantial i.e. tortilla and peanut butter or just fruit depending on how much breakfast), nap about 1130/1200, lunch about 1400, snack about 1600, dinner about 1730, bed about 1830.

When my DD first dropped to 1 nap at 15 months she couldn’t last until after lunch either so she was napping 10:30-12:30 and had lunch on waking. Bedtime was 7. Bit of a long wake window before bed but worked for her.

She’s 18 months now and I’ve moved her nap to 12:30 and she does fine with it.

Mine (twins) are two and a half now, but I remember having the same dilemma. I sort of did two small lunches for a while, instead of a large lunch and then a small snack.

I'd do large snack/small lunch at 11am and then nap. Then medium snack/small lunch at 1:30pm. Basically just split the food either side of the nap.

I do the same as others, so offer a small lunch at about 11/11.30 depending on what we’re doing, usually something like toasted wrap or crumpet and soft cheese, then when he wakes up he usually eats a full banana.

Thank you all for your posts! Really do appreciate it!

Can you suggest some heavy snack ideas I could offer the little one?