Skip to main content

Willow's naptime adventures

Willow is almost 7 months old. Most babies at that age have a morning nap and an afternoon nap.
Cherish and I know most babies have settled into two naps by now. We've read it in books. We've read it online. Our doctor has told us.
Willow does not get two naps.
Up to last weekend, she was getting four a day, a 20-minute nap at 8 a.m., a 40-minute nap at 11:30 a.m., a 40-minute nap at 3 p.m. and a 20-minute nap around 6:30 p.m. As you can see, she had a nap regimen. She usually slept for these lengths, but sometimes she'd clock a 1-hour nap, and occassionally she'd settle in for two or three hours.
Willow's doctor told us this nap routine was fine, but she wondered how OUR schedules were holding up to it. I'm staying home, so I adapt reasonably enough. Cherish and I also have read that although most babies have settled into two naps at this point, it's normal for a few babies to be frequent catnappers, just like Willow.
Cherish and I haven't sweated the napping, nor do we expect you to sweat it. Willow is happy and healthy, and she sleeps wonderfully peaceful at night.
But I wondered if that 8 a.m. nap was needed, so I started an experiment this week: I took that nap away from Willow.
And she hasn't missed it. She's even had two-nap days two days in a row, usually at 10 a.m. and 4 p.m. On top of that, her nighttime sleeping has even improved.
I'm not going to give her back that 8 a.m. nap, and we'll see where the rest of the day goes.
I suspect she'll have three naps on most days, but who knows, maybe she'll become that two-a-day baby those baby books seem to crave.
I'm leaving it up to her, for now.
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Willow's morning of play, play, play exhausts poor, old Dad

Willow's playtime universe continues to grow. Rapidly. Witness. In the midsummer heat, I take Willow out to our shaded backyard in the morning to play. And play she does. She climbed into her swing first. After I pushed her for a while, I got her out of the swing and put her in her wagon so she could help me convey bags of sand from the garage to the backyard to fill her sandbox (part of her new swing set) and her water table sandbox. She took rake and shovel and played in the sandbox for a bit. Then she waddled over to the deck and started to climb the steps to get to the water table. She played in the sand a bit, but most of her time was used dipping water up and out of the water part of the water table. Most the water ended up all over her. After that she wanted off the deck to go back to swinging. Instead I retrieved the new tricycle Cherish procured from a Franklin recycle center and cleaned it up. Willow loved the trike, holding on to the handle bars while I pushed her...
Post a Comment
Read more

Willow hones her friend-making skills

Up until now Willow has enjoyed the company of other tots her age only in the sense that where they are is where the fun and the toys are. That is to say she likes the toys and the gyms and the swings and if she has to be around these other toddlers, so be it. That's with kids her own age. She LOVES older kids, but they don't care much for her (other than "she's a baby," and Willow can't keep up with them, though she tries). Her older cousin, Rett, for example, hung the stars and moon in her opinion, so she'll just about do anything he does, including cozying up with him on the chair to watch a movie. And he does like her more than the typical older kid does. But as far as all the toddlers and babies roughly in Willow's age range, she doesn't have much use for them. She's not mean to them. She'll let them take a ball from her hand, for example (as some say, she plays well with others). But I can tell you, most definitely, she just doesn...
Post a Comment
Read more

Willow's tooth-brushing goes from rocky to rocking

Willow has been giving us fits for months now about brushing her teeth before bed. She's usually better brushing her teeth in the morning, meaning it's less like wrestling an alligator for me, but at night before bed, she turns into the Tasmanian Devil. We've tried making the tooth-brushing as fun as possible for her, but I usually end up holding her against her will while I try, mostly in vain, to pry the toothbrush into her clamped-shut mouth. Sometimes we give up. We've tried singing to her. Dancing. Story-telling. Tickling. Nothing has really worked. But Mommy might have hit on the solution. A singing toothbrush. Yesterday Mommy brought home a toothbrush that belts out Queen singing "We Will Rock You." This toothbrush ROCKS! And Willow loves it. We tried it out last night, and on the inaugural brushing, Willow brushed her teeth successfully all by herself. She danced the whole time too. And I stayed bruise free (I also, surprisingly, had more energ...
Post a Comment
Read more