*so a quick preface, I wrote this in Jan when Kaia was 13 months old, not much has changed! Except we have finally (very recently) jumped over to 1 nap per day :)
Key takeaways
Wake windows, sleep pressure, sleep environment
Give it a go! They might surprise you
Expect the worst, hope for the best
Have your own recipe for a good nap - ours is: cot, SnoozeShade, fan, sleep sack, bunny, white noise
Oh my GOD the naps…
I don’t know if it's just me but when your about to have a baby the one thing nobody seems to tell you about is how much sleep they need!
I think this limits a lot of people from getting out there and doing the adventure things, wanting to, NEEDING to prioritise those nap times. Believe me when I tell you, I am that person. Yes we get out there and do all the things but we also prioritise nap time and construct our days around her sleep, because we know how bad it can be when it all goes south and it ain't worth it!
As everyone should be telling you, all babies are different, and I am sure for many napping on the go is doable and works well (thank your lucky stars if this is you!) for us it's always been tricky, she’s a tricky sleeper, but we know that now and we put the parameters in place to make sure her sleep needs are being met while we can still function and live our adventurous lives.
Kaia’s ‘sleep story’ is a long one, and I'll go into more detail in another post, but for the time being below is how the hell we get her naps in wherever we are, doing whatever activity or adventure.
By the time we went away she had just gone to 2 naps per day (thank fucking god, because that third nap was a real pain in the ass at home, let alone on the road). I like 2 naps (currently still hanging onto it like a crazy person, even though she’s probably ready to drop to 1) because it suits our lifestyle. We know that we need to fit 2 in to make the day work and we have the option of doing a short morning nap then a longer arvo nap or vice versa, whatever works with our plans.
Do we wake her from naps? Absofuckinglutely we do.
At the moment we are waking from everything (morning, after nap 1 and after nap 2). Why? Because the day just flows SO much better. I believe that we are able to do what we do with such a happy little baby all the time because she is well rested and her sleep needs are being met. Does it suck sometimes when 30m in the morning IS NOT ENOUGH time for me to get anything meaningful done? Yeah it does, but it’s a decision that we made to prioritise sleep, and when it makes such an overwhelmingly positive outcome on your day and days as they flow nights, it’s totally worth it.
So here we are exhibit A, I finally sat down to write, I am half way through, I don’t want to stop because I know I will lose my train of thought, but it is 3:29 and I know that for a peaceful afternoon, good play, nice dinner and good bedtime settle, she operates well off 4h awake before bed. Because we don’t want bed running later than 7:30pm, I know I need to wake her now. To be continued!
Ok, so, one thing I like to tell myself (and Jacob) is lower your standards and your expectation of the sleep, then lower it some more. Assume the nap is going to fail and then anything that happens from there is a bonus! It sounds dire but it does help.
There are 3 main things you need to focus on - sleep environment, wake windows and sleep pressure.
Sleep environment - travel cot, SnoozeShade, fan, sleep sack, white noise, bunny. This is what we pack and take everywhere (even on the scooter!) it's our own little recipe for a bloody good nap. Yes it's annoying to lug the cot around everywhere, especially for Jacob, he’s the one that carries it as well as a million kilos of climbing gear, but the cot is her safe space, it's where she goes to fall asleep. She knows once we do all the things it’s time for sleep and she usually always will fall asleep, wherever we are.
The other 2 things we need to get right are wake windows (age appropriate and increase with age, hence the dropping of naps over time) and sleep pressure (making sure she isn't losing sleep pressure during her awake time to get a second wind and fight the nap). It's like a little constantly changing and evolving mathematical equation in my head and my busy brain LOVES it.
Our little routine is simple – at the moment (13.5 months) it looks like this:
6:30am – wake – boob on wake
Head out to wherever – climbing, beach etc.
7ish – breaky
Climb/swim/whatever
Nap 1 – wake window 3.5-3.75h - 9:30/9:45am – put her down. Wake at 10:45am
12ish – lunch
Nap 2 – wake window 4h – 2:30/2:45pm – put her down. Wake at 3:30pm
6ish – dinner
7 – boob
7:30pm – bed
When it's time for sleep, we convert the cot from playpen to sleep haven (take all toys out, put the SnoozeShade on, hang in the fan and chuck bunny in) then put her sleep sack on. Usually by now she’s already rubbing her eyeballs out because she knows what’s next, I walk her around in a little circle, sing twinkle twinkle little star then put her down, close the cover on the cot, turn on the white noise and hope for the best! We chuck a fan in because it's so humid in Thailand (and can be hot in Aus) and this helps circulate the air especially when the cot is covered. We don’t use a dummy, we did as a baby but ditched it at 4 months (wasn’t easy but super happy we got rid of it).
I cannot stress enough that this is just what’s working for us, at present. As I said earlier, she is a tricky baby!! So small adjustments of even 15m can really throw her out.
The biggest things are just to watch wake windows (not set times) and waking at the same time every day allows you to plan the days pretty consistently.
If the first nap goes to shit, even if she only gets 20m, it doesn’t really matter we just pull that second nap forward to 4h awake (or slightly less off the back of a short nap) from when she wakes and then give her a longer afternoon nap, still waking at 3:30pm for a 7:30pm bed.
I don’t know if this has helped at all but it's something that I get asked a lot about, especially of mums with young babies who feel nap trapped or confined to the four walls for naps in their perfect sleep environment because sleep is golden right? But the one thing that our sleep consultant told me that has really stuck is if this lifestyle is what you want when baby is older then you really need to be getting her used to it from a young age as it’s a lot easier to deal with when they are younger and there’s always another nap in the day you can play catch up on!
We put her down in the middle of a busy climbing crag now and people are genuinely shocked. She’s actually just going to have a sleep there? And more often than not, she does, and if it doesn’t work out, whatever at least we tried and we just get on with the day and make sure we prioritise that 2nd nap.
Another thing is honestly, don’t panic. I know it’s the hardest (and most bloody stressful) thing when your baby won't nap, and the anxiety is building up in you as you dread the overtired tornado that is surely to spill into the night but a) if your stressed baby will pick up on it and in turn not want to fall asleep (shit I know) and b) just give it a go! The amount of times I have been pleasantly surprised that she’s actually fallen asleep under these conditions where it would have been SO easy to panic, pack up and run off just before nap time because it was loud or busy or not a good nap environment but we have just given her the benefit of the doubt and she has fallen asleep, and slept beautifully!
Trust your little babes (and yourself) you got this!
Til next time,
R
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