Naps at home or naps on the go? Which camp are you in?

noahchristopher

We do most naps at home.  He sleeps so much better and longer in his crib.  It does keep us housebound, and we're starting to do one major outing a week where he'll take his second nap in the car (even though it's only a 30 min nap vs. over an hour if he were in his crib).  It's hard though, because he no longer takes a late cat nap and with a short 30 min car nap it's hard to get to bedtime without it being super early.

Just curious what other moms out there are doing.

dairygirl19

I PREFER naps at home. She just sleeps better and longer.

However, somedays I have stuff that has to get done so I'm not staying home on purpose just because it's nap time.

festivus

I try to do naps at home. While I rarely get out anyway with two, when I do I try as much as possible to schedule it around naptime. When that's not possible, I make sure the longest driving time is during their "usual" naptime. And I've even been know to drive around for an extra 15-20 minutes to extend the nap.

erika1677

I try to do her naps at home but if we have plans I time it around nap time so she sleeps in the car. There are also those days when she fights sleep and I will go drive around for an hour or so just to get a nap in.

erikaplustim

Naps on the go. I have to wear her anyway so might as well shop. Plus she only naps 45 min no matter what I do.

bluejetta

Naps at home -- she rarely falls asleep in the car unless it is a long highway drive and she doesn't often nap in her stroller either so it wreaks havoc if we're out and miss a nap.  We will nap at Nana's if needed when there for a family gathering.

As for outings, we are on 3 nap schedule so that makes it a bit easier to try and get things done between naps.  They aren't at the exact same time every day but within 30 mins or so. I think in another month or 2 we'll be at 2 naps and then I hope to do even more out and about. 

TeacherVicky

DS has 3 naps (the third is a late afternoon catnap) and we are usually always at home. When we do have to get out, I go right when he wakes up or I'll time it so that he has his cat nap in the carseat.

I don't mess with his first two naps. Ya, it means I'm housebound, but his sleep is more important than getting out at those times. Sleep is finally starting to get better and I finally managed to get him on a schedule and I'm not messing it up.

Jelliebean1982

My kids revolve around my world.  They do whatever is most convenient for the family as a whole.  If that means that baby naps on the go, so be it. 

ClickMama

We do a bit of both.  But I try not to disrupt both the morning and afternoon naps - I did that once, it was awful!

luvmyducks

I want her to take all her naps in her crib so she gets better at it hopefully.  Right now she usually will only nap 30-45 min in her crib.  But we have activities every day and she is still only up for a couple hours at a time, so she inevitably will fall asleep in her carseat for at least one of her naps a day.  She will nap like 2+hrs in that thing.  Drives me bonkers that she won't in her crib.

law&order

Depends on whether he's in a crappy nap phase (think 15-30 minutes) or he's napping well that week. I always make sure he gets his morning nap in the crib. But if he's having a bad nap week he will nap on the go for the afternoon

 

Sacagawea

We used to be a nap on the go when she was taking three naps, but now I have a better nap schedule and now we are a solid at home with naps for about 3 months now, and I am so happy!! I love being able to have some "me" time in the house instead of being stuck in the car waiting for LO to get up or hoping that LO doesn't wake if I take her out of the car.

noahchristopher

luvmyducks:

I want her to take all her naps in her crib so she gets better at it hopefully.  Right now she usually will only nap 30-45 min in her crib.  But we have activities every day and she is still only up for a couple hours at a time, so she inevitably will fall asleep in her carseat for at least one of her naps a day.  She will nap like 2+hrs in that thing.  Drives me bonkers that she won't in her crib.

I wonder if you can have it both ways???? It drives me bonkers that he won't sleep longer than 30min in his car seat

We got him used to his crib 1st because that's where we knew we would want him to sleep the most.  Now we're working on the out and about. 

It's good to know there's a lot of moms in my camp!!!  We're not alone. 

 

Karen1998

I do a mix of both. While I want to get out, I've also known enough overtired kids who were hellions because they were so tired that it's important to me to make sure he gets good sleep most days.  I try to do a blend during the week of outings and at home time.  If he doesn't get a good nap at all one day, then I try to make sure he gets at least a good afternoon one (since it's the longer one) the following day.  I also tend to protect Mondays and make them home days as he's always super tired from being so busy on the weekend.  Granted, it means that I do more short trips, as I'm trying to keep them within a 2 hour window of awake, fed and happy time.  We float between 2 and 3 naps a day.  The number depends on his wake up time. 

Here's an example - this week, we've been more home bodies than we were last week.  We were out and about every day last week.  We stayed in Monday.  Went to the doctor on Tuesday as he's had a cold and wasn't sleeping worth a flip because of it and I wanted to make sure his ears were clear.  Wednesday we went to Target just for a short trip (in and back at the house in an hour).  Today we had Kindermusik.  He napped before and then about an hour after.  We also plan to go to the store later if the dishwasher repairman will ever get here.  If he doesn't hurry up, then I'll likely just take him for a walk later.  Tomorrow we'll also likely do a store visit, as I have to pick a few more things up for the weekend.  In a typical week, we try to have at least 3-5 outings per week.  BTW, I count a walk as an outing.

noahchristopher

We actually do a lot of outings too, but we really try to schedule them around the naps.

We go to lunch or breakfast 2-3 times a week, go to the grocery store, Walmart, and the park.  We also have a pool in our neighborhood so we go there once or twice a week two, and tons and tons of walks in the neighborhood too.  He loves to be around people.  Today, after his first nap, he and I went to lunch and sat outside.  He chewed on my pickle and looked at all the people while I ate and took a bunch of pictures of him.

It's just the all day out and about outings that we've avoided.  Last week we did stay out all day and he took his 2nd nap in the car, and had a third cat nap later when we got home.  He did great and loved the whole day.  I just worry about doing that all the time since he's now not taking the cat nap anymore. 

When he's down to one nap a day it will be great to get out for longer periods of time without having to worry about the naps.  Oh, and when they're gone altogether....we will be out all the time.  And then I'll miss these days when he was taking nice naps at home probably.

melissa0726

We do 95% naps at home.  It got much easier to go out and do things on a two nap schedule because there's a long stretch in the afternoon that we can go out and about without me rushing home.  And if we're going further away from home (i.e. 30 mins away) I try to time it so our return car ride coincides with nap time. 

However, with summer coming and more activities to attend - family get togethers, barbeques and whatnot - we're going to start working on taking naps away from home in the pack n play.  I don't want to be confined to the house forever!

wendyll64

 Both. He doesn't have a problem sleeping in the car or on someone's lap.