6 month old 'routine'

[WorkingItOutForMyself]

Hi all.

My DS is a week shy of 6 months. His routine at the moment is based very loosely on the baby whisperer ideas. Basically he can go for around 2 hours before needing a sleep. So I just look at the clock when he wakes up and base our day around these naps.

EG today he woke up and fed at 7:30. He went down for a nap at 9:30 and slept for 30 mins. He'll go back down around midday and then again at about 3:30. He'll sometimes nap twice again in the afternoon. He'll never sleep for more than 40 minutes and I know this is common at this age.

I feel like he should be having a longer nap at lunchtime now that he's almost 6 months. He struggles in the afternoon once he's woken up from his 3rd nap, as he can't stay awake the 3/4 hours before bedtime but boy does he fight sleep!!

Interested to hear what other 6month olds do, napwise.

Is it worth trying to extend the midday nap at this stage? I'm aware it'll probably get longer of it's own accord at some point, but given that he's struggling in the afternoons, is it worth helping him along?

VERY occasionally he will fall back asleep again after his short nap if he's in the buggy, but it's still quite rare that this happens. If he does though, he'll easily sleep for 2+ hours!

Sorry it's a bit rambly... I'm just aware that was working for us, might need a bit of tweaking over the next few weeks.

TIA

Oooh watching with interest.
My almost 7mo ds is same as you've said still. Twice he's had an almost 2hr nap in the afternoon. That's it. Will be interesting to read replies.

sorry no help!

My DC4 (5 1/2 months) is just transitioning from frequent short naps to longer daytime sleeps.

I've always done naps in the bouncy chair in the lounge (unless we are out) and so have always bounced DD back to sleep should she stir from her naps. Up until a few weeks ago she rarely wanted more than 45 minutes sleep at a time so woke up when not tired anymore.

But recently I found that she could easily be bounced back to sleep and stay asleep for much longer, sometimes well over an hour. After a couple of weeks of this (still in bouncy chair) she didn't need bouncing back to sleep, would just stay asleep in the chair,

It was a few days in a row of these extended naps happening that lead to me to move her morning and lunchtime naps into the cot rather than the bouncy chair. As a result she usually sleeps for 2 hours in the morning, 2 hours at lunchtime and then 45 mins (bouncy chair) afterschool.

This has all happened in a baby lead way. The key was being about to sooth back to sleep upon stirring, do you have a way to do this? I wouldn't change your routine (which sounds good to me) just see if you can get her to go back to sleep when she wakes.

My DD is just transitioning so I don't expect naps to go smoothly every day, but definitely getting there. She's currently upstairs in the cot and has been asleep since 9.30am.

Fate - that's good advice.

Routine wise I like him to be able to nap anywhere (pram, car seat, chair, cot). He's napping on a friends bed at the moment!

At home he naps in the cot, but sometimes the swing or the bouncer.

Maybe I'll move the bouncy chair into his nursery and try transitioning him through the sleep cycles... I'll give it a go a few times and if it doesn't work I'll assume he's not ready for it yet :-)

I hope it's coming though as our afternoons are hard work at the moment!

He's off to nursery in just over a month so I want to get a stricter routine in place by getting up at the same time every day so I can tell them what to expect!