Can't tell if 9 month old is overtired or undertired!

[Ashley001]

This probably sounds really silly but I feel like my little girl gives me very mixed signals. She wakes at around 6.30 each day and has a bottle, however within an hour of being awake she often starts rubbing her face as if shes tired. On occassion I can get her to go back to sleep in our bed after her bottle but most often not. I have tried giving her breakfast at around 8 and then putting her back to sleep but she just screams. When I eventually give in and get her back out again she happily sits and plays with her toys. I have tried this at every hour to try and find a time that suits her but all she seems to do is scream and the only place she sleeps is in the car.

I'm desperately trying to establish some sort of routine but when we stay at home for the day and I try to get her to sleep in the cot she ends up only having 20-30 minutes sleep all day. At night she is better, if she has had hardly any sleep in the day she pretty much passes out at about 7pm, although she has been waking at around 4am, coming into our bed and going straight back to sleep. If she has had more sleep in the day then she sometimes cries for a bit longer at night, but on the whole it doesnt take too long to get her to sleep.

Any thoughts or advice on what I could do differently to help her sleep better?

Some don't sleep a lot during the day. By the time my daughter was 10 months she was only having one 20 30 min nap during the day.

If she's rubbing her face could she be teething?

Mines give mixed signals all the time. She also has significantly reduced her napping at 5.5months. an hour in morning and then 20 mins for any other naps.

Yep, we get mixed signals all the time (6 months old). She’d happily survive on the minute power naps if it was up to her - the only way we can get 3 x half hour naps is to put her in pram with Snoozeshade over and white noise on, push her back and forth for a few minutes and ignore moaning until she gives in.

Nursery laughed when I went for the tour and was embarrassed to admit how she naps; they made a very good point that naps are for 2-3 years, bedtime is for life. I’d say do what you need to do (ie car) to make sure she’s not overtired and screamy and leave it at that!