Dropping a nap at 9 months old???

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My DS is 91/2 months old and until recently, he was taking two naps - at 10am (for 1 hour) and 2pm (45min-1hour) and sleeping at night from 7pm to 6am. Lately, it's become increasingly difficult to get him to take his morning nap and some mornings I won't get him down until 11am. This nap is longer than his previous morning nap-- 1 1/2 hours. This makes his second nap at 2pm difficult so I've resorted to putting him in his stroller at 3 or 3:30 pm and he'll sleep easily in there for 45 min. Then, because of this later nap, I'm putting him down at 8pm and he's now waking at 6:30 or so. I've heard many friends tell me that this is typical when a baby is trying to "drop" one of their naps. However, I've not heard of any baby doing it this young! Is this really a transition to one nap and do I just "go with the flow" or continue to try and impose the old nap times in the hopes that he will go back to napping at 10 and 2??

Yes, I would go with the flow. Why not try putting him down pretty soon after lunch. If he can get to 12noon without flling asleep, then he's ready to drop a nap.

My younger two only ever slept once a day anyway, once out of tiny-babyhood. Both in the afternoon. You might find that you get to a more workable schedule of active morning (eg some time at toddler group), lunch, 1.5hr nap (so you can get the irnong done) and then 3pm waking (say) in time for play, tea, wind-down to bed.

It really isn't worth (IMHO) spending an hour of yr day tryign to get a baby to sleep! There are no real rules about these things IME.

Yes, go with the flow, my ds used to have two naps then reorganised himself for one longer in the pm only. He also had a period of time where he hardly slept at all during the day. When he gets on his feet he will ware himself out a lot more and probably start to really need a good long sleep in the day. Currently he is 2.5 and goes back to bed for 2-3 hours a day and he has done that for quite a long time now. Get down to playgroup to ware him out.

Thanks for the advice. My gut feeling is also to go with the flow. However, I think he's at a weird stage where 1 nap isn't quite enough and two is awkward. Yesterday I stretched him to noon and he "crashed" (ie cried hard until fell asleep) for 1 1/2 hours. He was quite cranky most of the afternoon after that until he fell asleep again in his stroller for 45 min at 4pm. He was still exhausted at bedtime and again "crashed" early at 7:30pm. My feeling is that until he's ready to take a longer sleep after lunch - like 2 hours or so - it may be necessary to continue putting him down late morning and then again in the mid afternoon (as inconvenient as this is). Any additional thoughts?

my dd is nearly 9mths and has one nap. She goes to bed 7pm sleeps until 8am then will have one nap in afternoon for around 2hrs from 1.30/2pm until 4 pm. I make sure she is woken up by 4.30pm so she goes to bed easily at 7.

what about putting him down earlier..what time does he wake up? my dd used to sleep at around 9.30am for 20mins then I would wake her up until the bigger nap in afternoon.

Nemo, he wakes up around 6:15-6:30am for the day. I've actually noticed that many mornings he'll briefly get cranky and rub his eyes at 8:30am and I've considered trying to put him down for a really early nap, but I'm reluctant because I've read that allowing a nap that early might encourage the baby to wake up earlier in the morning (Ferber says). I'm doubtful that DS would take a nice long afternoon nap like your DD -- he's never napped longer than 2 hours under any circumstances. Not sure if I'm willing to try this yet . . .

DS only had an afternoon nap (1-2 hours) by 10 months. Then 12 hours at night.

DS "dropped" a nap round about this age.
dd has never really napped in the am and has 1 hour 30 ish pm.Shes 9 months.

They are all different.Play it by ear and go with your little un.

I rhink it is pretty common to drop a morning nap at this age. Why not give him a long nap at around 11/11.30am and then put him to bed ultra early - around 5.30/6pm but avoid a 3/4pm nap. I did this with DS for a while and he didn't wake up any earlier.

After a while he will probaly stay up longer in the morning and can take one afternoon nap again. When they drop a nap they often need an earlier bedtime for a while to make up for it.