Purposely skipping a nap?

shelbydd

Im curious if any of you have ever done this. LO and I frequently travel to visit my in laws. It's about a 5 hour drive and since we haven't had good experiences traveling during the day I generally do it at his bedtime and he sleeps through the whole trip. I'm supposed to be going tomorrow but am in a bit of a predicament because Lo's bedtime has gotten later. I used to be able to put him down in the car after his bedtime routine between 6:30 and 7, putting me at my in laws usually around midnight. It's a bit late since LO used to get up around 6:30am but doable if I went to sleep right after we got there.

the problem is that LO now isn't going to bed until almost 9pm and his wake stretches are longer now. If we go through our normal routine it'll be 2am if not later before we get to there house. so my question is.. What are your thoughts on skipping his second nap tomorrow? Bad idea? Any suggestions for trying to get him to go to bed earlier?

vibarra27

You dont want to try it again driving while hes awake? @least just an hour? Maybe he can handle it now? I just feel so bad you have to work around his bed time that much.

Or maybe just cut his naps short rather than not letting himslleep @ all.

amp61470

What about going when he goes down for a nap? Does he have access to toys in his car seat? I would try it again. I find the older he gets the more amused he is in the car. 

shelbydd

Unfortunately he doesn't do well in the car unless it's time for a nap or bedtime, in which case he sleeps wonderfully. If I give him toys he throws them out of the seat, he's going through that phase where he wants you to fetch things. I want to get a DVD player for my car but just didn't have the finances to do it before this trip. I can attempt a daytime trip but It's never a good experience when we've tried in the past. Even going 30 minutes across the city I sometimes end up regretting.

jen83mn

Our LO has skipped a few afternoon naps this week while we've been on vacation ... he's been sleeping in later and taking a long morning nap, so when his afternoon nap rolls around he just lays in his crib awake for 30-45 minutes, not tired at all. On those days, we've just been putting him to bed 30 minutes earlier than his usual bedtime and he goes right to sleep since he's been up for so long then. If you're not sure how he'll do, you could always try it out the day before and see if it works at home and if he falls asleep earlier!

missliz53

I would shorten his naps that day rather than skip the last one. I think that if you do, you run the risk of him being over-tired when you are ready to leave and screaming in the car, which would be miserable for you both. Either way, I would try it at home firsr to see how it goes. 

Mine will skip naps and be ok, but we were visiting my brother and we put her in her pjs, fed her, and left when it was her normal bedtime. She fell asleep right away, but when we got home, she screamed for 2 hrs and it was horrible, so we won't be trying that again for a while. 

tlc11934

Skip the second nap and leave at 6.  Maybe the car will put him to sleep! 

shelbydd

My son has always slept in the car really well so that was my thought process as well @tlc11934 ! Thank you all for the advice! We took our trip and things went smoothly.. Good news is we decided to attempt a trip during the day coming home and it went surprisingly well!! We left at his first nap time and he slept for 2 and half hours, we stopped for lunch and spent about 2 hours out of the car, when we got back in he took his second nap and woke up about 4 miles from home. If you guys only knew how anxious the thought of taking a day trip was to me for so long! I'm relieved to finally know we can do it.

vibarra27

Yay! Im so happy it worked out!!