Naptime for One Year Old

Hi,
My experience with this has been that both of my children gave up the morning nap around 1 year. The afternoon nap became earlier. At times my 22 month old will seem tired early so I put her down and then she skips the afternoon nap and goes to bed early that night. That way the next day she is refreshed and can hold out for the afternoon nap. Generally she goes in for a nap around 1:30 or 2 and she sleeps until 4:00. I don't let her go longer than that or I have to move her bed time. She goes to sleep at 7:00-7:30pm and gets up at 7am. Hope it helps

At around 13-14 months I started putting my son down for one nap a day at around 12:30 cause I was running into a similar problem. It took a few days for him to adjust to the new schedule (it's like resetting their internal clock) but now he's 3.5 and he still goes down at that time for naps. He's a very early riser- and I def. had concerns about waiting til 12:30 to put him down- but in the end it worked. Give it a try! Good luck!

at one it is customary to start to go for one nap. I would try to hold off on the 1st nap 'til after lunch and put her down to sleep for her nap then. hopefully she will take a nice long nap in the afternoon for you and be pleasant for dinner.

HI R.,
When my son hit about 1 year I was at the same crossroads not knowing what path to take. On the advice of many mothers, I aimed for the one nap a day route. Depending on what time your daughter wakes up in the morning, shoot for 12-1 o'clock, after lunch. Try and keep her awake until then. You can pretty much guarantee she will do her AM BM by then, and by the time nap time rolls around she will be so tired, she should crash for you for a couple (or more!) hours. This should jive with her bedtime of 7 o'clock. The beauty of one nap is that it is a nice long one so you can get quite a bit accomplished and have a little down time, she will be well rested and happy. Good luck!

Hi R. - since your daughter won't go down for a second nap until late afternoon (after a morning nap), she's probably ready to transition to one afternoon nap only. This is about the age that it can happen, and it may take a few weeks for her to adjust. Keep her awake as long as you can in the mornings, until she goes down for the afternoon nap by 1PM. It's also helpful to keep her on a regular schedule in terms of bed time - with one nap, she may be ready to go down for the night by 6:30 or 7PM and sleep through the night. A helpful book is "Health Sleep Habits, Happy Child" by Marc Weissbluth. Good luck.

I found with my three children that the one year to eighteen month mark was when we gave up the morning nap and went to a good 2 hour nap right after lunch. After playing or doing errands all morning, they were ready for naptime right after lunch. That way you have the morning free again to visit, shop, or just play, not having to work around sleep time. You get a good "break" in the afternoon while your little one sleeps. She will play again for a few hours, eat supper, have her bath and be back in bed for the night at her regular bedtime.

try one nap, gradually push the one nap a little later to help her adjust.

i'd elminate the monring nap - and aim for 1 nap between 1-3ish.

by skipping the morning nap she may nap by like 12noon.... and then as she gets old her nap will creep later. my daughter started like this. by the time she was 2 her nap was (and still is) from 2-4 each afternoon

I'd definitely cut the morning nap. She'll go down earlier in the afternoon, solving your problems. Good luck!

By 14 months she should only be taking one nap a day- after lunch time- and lasting 2-3 hours.
This seems to be the consensus among all my mom friends. I'm surprised she's put up with the naps this long!
My second daughter stopped her naps altogether by the time she was 18 months old. She just upped her bedtime to 6:30 and slept till 8:00 am.
Get rid of that morning nap and free up some free time for yourself to run errands or plan play dates!

Hi R., It sounds like she is ready to switch to one long afternoon nap. I went through this and it is a hard trasition for a while and before you know it she will have nice long afternoon naps. try keeping her up until after lunch. My guy is almost 3 now and is sleeping from 1pm to 5! The book "Healthy sleep Habbits, Happy Baby" was a god send for us. Good luck. HJS

How funny! I was struggling with this about a month ago, too! My oldest daughter turned two in January and was taking two small naps, as well. I finally stopped putting her down for an early nap and keeping her busy all morning to keep her awake and on good behavior. (When she is bored she becomes very cranky.) Anyway, it has helped tremendously! We are able to go out in the mornings, enjoy play dates and lunches and then she usually is so tired about that she goes down at about 1p and takes a long nap in the afternoon.

However, i do start making dinner at 4 and making sure she is up by 430p so we can keep her on the 7-8p bedtime routine. Sometimes she does not sleep the entire time, but reads and plays with her toys in her room after she wakes up. I leave the door shut and she has her quiet time to unwind. (Don't we all need that?) Occasionally, we have gone out in the morning and she falls asleep in the car on the way home so we skip lunch for a nap instead, but then she has a snack when she wakes up. It doesn't happen too often, so it is no big deal.

I think the best thing you can do is start a routine and keep it no matter what you decide!! Good luck!

R.,

My daughter is also 14 months and is on a 1 nap a day schedule. It works out really well for us. She start her lunch by noon and her nap starts between 1 or 1:30pm. She sleeps about 2 or 2-1/2 hours and is tired again for her bedtime between 6:30 and 7pm.
Some of her friends have an earlier nap time starting at 11am but they don't have lunch until afterwards and that doesn't work for us. I like the lunch then bed.
I would try going down to 1 nap a day and see if that helps the schedule.

Good luck,
L. M

hi-yes try to get your daughter on 1 nap in the middle of the day. she will be cranky at first but, she will get used to it. try for at least 2 wks...it's tiring. but that way she'll crash at bedtime. i went thru this w/my 1st daughter. she wouldn't take a 2nd nap after 6 months old! So I've had a lot of experience w/this (haha!)

Hi- exactly around that time my son did the same so I started one big nap - he would go down @12:30 and sleep for a few hours...now he goes down @ 1:30 and I don't let him sleep past 4pm..I just have to turn off his noise machine and he wakes up gradually...then bedtime is 7:30pm. Good luck!

My son was around 15 months old when we moved to 1 nap a day. If you can keep her awake until ~ 12:30/1 PM (or as close to that as you can) so that she'll sleep the afternoon away and be tired enough for bedtime.

Due to her young age, some days you will see in the morning that she will need to nap (ie: she hasn't slept well or has been extra active) so you should still put her down. Try to put her down ~ 9:30 AM and wake her up around the 45 minute mark (don't let her sleep too long as it will disrupt the afternoon nap). If she's up by 10:30 AM, she should be able to go to sleep around 2 PM (typically a 3 hour gap gets them tired enough) to around 4 PM.

hi R.,
i would aim for movcing to one nap a day....this may be at 11am or a bit later. (i am going on the experience i had with my son now 3)
during the transition if an AM rest is needed maybe an early morning walk/run in the stroller (good for both of you) and then keep her going until mid day - hoping for a 2+ hour nap. b/c the nap will be later maybe she will have already had a BM and this will not disrupt her.
but since going to one nap is the next step (at least eventually) i say why not try now?!
good luck!

My daughter had the same issues as yours. It really helped us to move my daughter to one early afternoon nap. She now has lunch by 11:30, noon at the latest, and is asleep by 12:30. She usually sleeps 2-3 hours. Her bedtime is still around 7 pm.

She wakes in the morning at about 6:30, so she is still sometimes tired in the late morning. Between 9 and 10, we try harder to keep her occupied (going out for a walk, running our errands during that time) so that she doesn't nap until the afternoon. It was a surprisingly easy adjustment for her.

It does mean we can't do much on weekends during the afternoon, but it makes for a much happier toddler!

R.,

My youngest is the same way so we did away with her morning nap and now she usually goes down around noon and wakes up around 3. I think it has worked out for her because she gets really tuckered out from the morning and wakes up wanting to play again and then is ready for bed at 7:30. If you can try to get her to have her bowel movement in the morning that way she will stay asleep. Do you find that certain things you feed her help her go? I usually give my daughter oatmeal or applesauce in the morning to help her. Good luck and I hope this helps!

J.

Try to get her on one nap make sure that you wait until after she has had a bowel movement so she won't wake due to one. My 2 yr old used to nap at 11-1 which worked great he was an early riser 5am and went to bed early so he was up about 6 hours then napped and then was up about another 6 before bed.

Skip the morning nap and put her down right after lunch. It should hold her over until bedtime.