Hawaii Babies
MrsNJSwimmer
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do you have a naptime routine?
MrsNJSwimmer
member
If so, what is it? Do you do something like your bedtime routine?
If not, how do you get LO to realize it's naptime?
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Re: do you have a naptime routine?
Wow! I sooooo need to get on the ball like you guys. Henry naps fine usually, but only after being rocked to sleep. It doesn't take long....if he's tired, I'll put his sleepsack on and give him a paci and cuddle and rock. He's usually asleep enough to put him down after about 5 minutes. But I know I can't rock him to sleep forever. I really need to start putting him down sleepy but awake, don't I?
ours is similar to ericka and lisa - quietly take to room while telling him it's naptime, turn on the seahorse, double swaddle, i say "have a good nap, E", offer binky and pat/shush if needed - then either sit down next to crib (not looking at him, but i stick my arm through the slats and rest it on his chest) or walk out. we're working on getting to the point where we can just walk out (like i just did - and when i checked 5 min later, he was asleep, yay!)
eta: we do the exacrt same thing for night too, except add in bedtime stories and a diaper change right before putting him down. (whereas i may or may not always change him before naps, depending on when i last changed him)
we just do a mini version of her bedtime routine....
she goes potty, gets a fresh diaper, i nurse her, then we read the same "quiet time" book, then i turn on her seahorse and put her in the crib and say "night night" and then walk out
(if she says "tuck in" then i'll also lay a blanket over her. at night i ask her "do you want me to tuck you in?" and that's where the request for "tuck in" came from.) sometimes she plays quietly for a minutes before napping, sometimes she talks for a bit, sometimes she cries for about a minute, or sometimes she just lays there but she more or less falls asleep within 1-15 minutes from when i put her down 
it used to be that it would be 15-30 min.... and i don't know if it's better now b/c she is more tired (with just 1 nap/day) or if it is b/c she knows it's nap time now? either way, it seems to work out well for us 
Jaime & Brent
Oahu, Hawaii | Sept. 9, 2005
My Food Blog - Good Eats 'n Sweet Treats
Wow! I'm so impressed by all of you whose babies nap on their own. I'll have to try that early on for the next one...
A takes two naps a day, and we have a routine for the first one. About 2 hours after he wakes, he'll be ready to nap. We go to his room, close the door, turn on the lullabies and snuggle on a mat on the floor. He'll take his paci, nuzzle up to me, close his eyes and then go to sleep. Now I try to leave before he's in deep sleep (i.e., when I still see him sucking the paci), since I'd like him to eventually lie down and nap on his own. I just love that snuggle time, though! This is pretty similar to bedtime, except bedtime is more drawn out since we'll read and sometimes Daddy will join us for quiet play time.
For the second nap of the day, he'll either fall asleep in the car or in the Ergo whenever he's tired. We're usually out for the day by late morning, so thankfully he's flexible and just goes with the flow for that one.
I'm curious -- for the mamas whose babies nap/sleep on their own, how and when did you start that?
We tried that whole "sleepy but awake" thing when he was young, but he would always cry when left alone. We tried the patting and revisiting to reassure stuff, and we even let him cry at one point, but he just wasn't having it. Maybe we didn't persist long enough, but I'm really wondering how you all managed it!
Honestly? I didn't have a choice.
I couldn't cuddle both boys at once, so we never even got to the "sleepy but awake" stage - they were put down wide awake pretty much from the beginning.
Well, I shouldn't say that - Will was put down wide awake, because he'd put himself to sleep without rocking even when he was just a few weeks old (in fact, rocking actually kept him awake!). Dash liked a bit of a cuddle first and had a nightly rocking ritual because he'd spend a solid hour screaming every night at 10pm like clockwork until he was about 3 months old, but even with him we moved to patting pretty fast, since I could pat both of them at once by reaching into both cribs. This isn't to say we never held them while they slept during the day, since we did - just that it wasn't all the time.
I've read so much about it being a hard transition from rocking/cuddling to falling asleep on their own that I think we were really lucky that we didn't have high need babies - I'm not sure what we would have done in that case.
But I suppose all of this is pretty useless to you lol! Anyway, I'd just keep persisting - repetition and routine seem to be the keys to just about every transition in a baby's life. Oh, and I'd try to make sure he's the right amount of tired when you try - ready for a nap, but not overtired, since that would probably make it a lot harder!
E was like that too but we just kept trying. When she starts crying, I'd also end up picking her up.
I can't remember exactly when she finally "got it". I think sometime between month 3-4. We started following the EASY routine when she was 6 weeks old. We worked on her bedtime routine first. We used to do eat, bath, read book and sleep. We would rock her to sleep then. At some point, we changed it up a bit so that we cluster feed before we start her bedtime routine, play, bath, last feeding for the night and read book. When we did that, she would fall asleep while we were feeding her and won't stay up when we read the book. We just keep doing and doing it until one day after feeding, she stayed up enough while we read the book and then when we put her down, she fell asleep on her own. We just continued doing it. Now, she's so used to the routine. Sometimes after her last feeding, I'd rock and snuggle with her for a little bit. She'd lay her head on my shoulder with her eyes closed but when i start reading "Goodnight Hawaii" she lifts her head up, turns and listen while i read the book. Sometimes when I don't start reading soon enough, she'll turn her head and look for the book. She'll lean down side table where we keep the book lol. She also likes to flip the book while I am reading so I'd have her sit on my lap so she can turn the pages. There are times when I still want to snuggle with her after reading the book, but she would fuss meaning she wants to be put down, swaddled and go to bed lol. After we perfected the bedtime routine, we worked on naps.
I agree with Lisa that the key is routine. It helps them to know what's coming. Just keep trying and one day they'll just surprise you :-).