Survival tips for managing non sleeping baby

[DancingGoose]

Hi all

I'm posting on behalf of a friend..

She has 2 DC - 7wo and 5yo. New baby isn't good at sleeping for large chunks of the day. He won't settle to sleep from late afternoon to bedtime so gets overtired and cries a lot. DFriend is cluster feeding him from say 5-7pm after which he will go down no problem in the Moses basket.

She's struggling a bit to get anything else done, like preparing food, getting ready to go out etc.,because he's wont really sleep for a good chunk of time at home and want to be held all the time. And the fact he gets so tired between 5-7pm and needs/wants to be fed before bed is making it tricky to make dinner, do anything with her 5yo etc.

I hope I've set the scene accurately enough!

Are there any tips firstly on helping her baby to sleep during the day, and secondly any timesaver tips to getting things done before she hits the 5-7pm grumpy baby slot!

oh and I forgot to say that going out with the baby in the buggy helps him to sleep, but again prevents her from getting anything done at home.

Babywearing might work - if one of the DTs was asleep and the other wasn't, I'd pop her in a sling so I had hands free to do stuff, and invariably she'd go to sleep anyway.

Sling. Lifesaver. A good stretchy wrap style one so baby is up on her chest. The movement of getting stuff done will actually help baby sleep. Ds2 lived in his for 3 months (90% of naps) - and decent naps mean that when baby is awake it'll be a bit calmer.

I used a close caboo (and DH and I had one each for our twins!)

Slow cooker and batch cooking are her friend. And accepting beans on toast or scrambled eggs are a perfectly adequate meal.

Yes yes yes to a sling, total life saver! Never cook just one meal, always do double quantities for the freezer/next day. A slow cooker is also brilliant - do (or get someone else to do) all the prep the previous night and stick it in the fridge, then pop it on the next day and it will be ready for dinner.

Agree on a sling. Also on not stressing too much about getting stuff done. Much of it will wait.