Almost 9 month old - please could you share your routine (naps, meals, bedtime etc)

[Madallie]

Am having difficulties getting a schedule that works and sticks. DD has never been a great sleeper but really want to try and improve things. Please could you share what works for you.

Would be great to hear stories of bad sleeper turned good!

bump?!

My DD is 7 months so a bit younger but our routine is:
7am bottle
8ish breakfast (porridge & toast)
9am nap (45 mins to 2 hours but usually 1.5hr)
11am bottle
12 ish Lunch
1pm nap (as above)
3pm bottle
5ish dinner
6ish bath
7ish bottle & bed
10.30 / 11 dream feed
This is all flexible so if she's tired before nap time I put her down for a nap early and if we're out for the day she sleeps when she sleeps (depending on where we are).

Thanks for your help. Wish I could get a schedule like this. We're all over the place at the moment.

So far this week we've had a 7.15am, 4.45am, 6.15am wake up for the morning and for the other days everything else in between.

Have no idea where I'm going wrong or if this unpredictable pattern is just unfixable...for now.

Getting myself in knots trying to change, tweak, fix it! It's become my 'each day's mission' to get some sort of reliable routine but I fear I never will. At least not for now!!!

want a routine here too; naps sort of OK, but sleep a PITA. Missed nap this afternoon, crashed at 6, up twice since then. Always wakes at least once in the night. This is dd2 and I am getting tired of no sleep, no energy, no life other than minding, wiping, caring for them all the time.

Back to dd2 - insofar as we have a routine it looks a bit like this:

wake 7am
bf
breakfast - plus few ozs bottle
9am nap - usually an hour, sometimes longer
11am snack and drink
1ish - lunch + bottle
2ish nap - sometimes this is later - it's usually about 45mins-hour
4 bottle
5.30ish dinner + bottle
6.30 bath
7 bed for the night

as I say will usually wake during evening and at least once in night...but actually she has a pretty good routine, it's just that she won't stay abloodysleep at night

I hear you Rhetorician - very similar here - altho with vastly varying wake up times, making a routine or schedule toturous to try and figure out/stay with.

I actually give myself a stress headache daily trying to 'sort' the problems of early waking, night wakings etc

A very rough idea of any sort of routine we have etsablished is like this (again this works sometimes, for a few days and then goes out the window so off I go to try and 'fix' things again but wahc time to no avail.

6ish - wake
I do not get dd out of cot until 7am (she plays and chats very happily til then...sometimes she even has the cheek to YAWN!)
7-7.30 - quiet playtime upstairs
7.45 - milk 8oz
8.45 - breakfast
9.30 - down for nap. Usually sleeps 9.45-10.45/11
10.45/11 - up, get ready, play, sometimes a snack
12.45 - lunch (solids - veg based)
1.30 - milk 8oz (sometimes only takes 6oz)
1.45/2pm - nap sleep fpr between 1hr and 1hr 20mins (try to put her down 3hrs after waking from nap 1.
3/3.15 - wake, play, often go out at this time even just for a walk with dd
5pm - dinner (2 courses - savoury like meat, pots and veg followed by banana or yogurt)
6.15 - bedtime routine - bath, p.js, bottle, songs and quiet time in her room
6.45 - in cot - she self settles
7.00pm - aim to be asleep.

Just wish this routine would work on a regular basis! Don't know how else to tweak/improve/change it.

Tired if thinking and tired of trying to!

DD1 never had any kind of routine and is still a terrible sleeper at 2.5.

We followed the baby whisperer plan when she was 4 months old. It was a specific plan for a baby who had had no routine at all. We ebf until 5.5 months so were bf at time of doing the plan.
We went from several night feeds to sttn in about 4 days. It was so easy and didn't have to leave Dd crying at all.
I really cannot recommend it enough. The plan is for a four month old but can be done at any age apparently, although will take longer to establish.

Thanks JM - our problem is that DD doesn't even wake to feed, she just wakes... to chat, gurgle, fuss etc and when she does wake early it's not for food cos she just plays happily and chats. Infact when I have just left her for about an hr happily chirping away she has actually fallen back to sleep for 1-2hrs but by then I've been wide awake since 5or so and have not chance of getting back to sleep.

When she does wake she shows no interest in food/milk until 7.30/45am at earliest.

This is why NW and EW are a mystery to me and probably why I can't resolve them.

Oh well, at least she's a happy, healthy and totally adorable little bubs (my totally unbiased opinion of course!!)

Madallie your routine is not very different to ours really. I have found if she goes more than 2 hours between naps she is overtired & takes longer to go to sleep / doesn't nap as long.
If she has had quite short naps or just seems tired we do a 20 minute power nap around 5ish, if we miss this she wakes in the night.

Regarding sleeping all night I don't think it's just the routine I think it's because she can self settle so actually she does wake in the night sometimes but gets herself back to sleep.
It's a good job cos I'm still getting up with her older sister (3 times last night!) - really wish I could sort that.

Thanks JP - DD also self settles but maybe sometimes just takes a while to go back. Maybe this isn't called 'NW' as she goes back herself and I (mostly) don't need to go to her.

I've heard lots of people say that if you cut the AM nap to about 30/45mins then this will make the pm nap longer (like 2hrs). My dd has never slept that long for naps so I'm afraid to do this in case she just has another short pm nap. She will totally refuse to go down for a 3rd cat nap too. This is why I push pm nap til 2pm cos even at worse if she only has 45mins I can still get her to bed time (just), even if it has to be 6.30pm/6.45pm (don't want to keep her up more than 4hrs).

My dd is 9.5 months she's been in the same routine for a few months now, she isn't the best sleeper at night but I think it's more due to the fact that she suffers so much with teething she's cutting teeth now in fact
6.30 wakes - I leave her in the cot to play till 7.15.
7.40 breakfast of porridge and toast
9.00 milk 7 oz and nap 1 hr
11.30 lunch fruit or veg
1.30 milk 7 oz and nap 1.5 - 2 hrs
4.30 dinner
6 .00 bath
7.00 milk 7 oz bed

She's a great sleeper in the day but started fighting the morning sleep abit, I'm actually looking forward to her dropping it as its difficult to get her to play groups as she's always fast asleep at the time they all start