Moving to one nap

Sorry, sweetie, my kids were right around a year (give or take a couple of months), too.

How long is the nap he's taking?

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Lochlan usually takes two naps a day, pretty regularly but lately it has been very difficult to put him down for a morning nap. He only had one long afternoon nap yesterday after many attempts to put him down for a morning nap. I'm starting to think that he may need only one nap a day. Just now, I tried to put him down for his morning nap because his eyes look really tired but he did not fall asleep. What I do is make one attempt and if he does not nap in the morning, I just wait until the afternoon and put him down a little earlier, say 2 instead of 3. Just go with your instincts and watch for Nolan's cues.

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It seems to me that there should be a wealth of this kind of information at http://www.trixietracker.com/. You could sign up for their free trial and then hopefully have access to sleep patterns for anonymous users with babies of the same age.
Stuff like this, which shows a 12 month old baby with two naps:
http://www.trixietracker.com/inside/?p=11

I haven't used it, but it looks pretty informative.

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My daughter moved from 2 naps a day (varying from 45 minutes to 2 hours each depending on the day) to one nap at 11 months. I noticed she was not going down for her later nap till later each day and was then not going to bed easy at bedtime. So I moved her to one nap at 12:00. She now sleeps a blissful 2-3 hours every afternoon and sleeps from 7pm to 7am... The first few days of this switch were hard on us both (as she was a bit cranky) but now it is much better... I would say go with what Nolan is telling you... Good luck

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Here's my approximate schedule for my 21 month old twins.

6 months: 3 naps (total 5 hours), 10 hours at night
12 months: 2 naps (total 3 hours), 12 hours at night
15 months 1 nap in the AM (3 hours), 12 hours at night
20 months: 1 nap after lunch (2 hours) 12-13 hours at night.

They always sleep together and my errands are scheduled around their naps. Sure, I break the rules every once in awhile, but then it takes a day or two to get "my babies" back. I always say, a well napped baby is a happy baby.

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My daughter was about a year when she moved to one nap. I expected her to give up her morning nap, but she ended up first eliminating the afternoon nap. It made a VERY long day when she would be awake from 11am - 8pm! Slowly she started needing her morning nap later and later until around age 2 she was taking a 2pm nap. She naps now from about 2-3:30 and sleeps from 8pm-6 or 7am. At this point I am just thankful that she naps at all!

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Our baby girl just turned 1 at the end of last month, and is down to one nap. It happened around 11 months.

She will usually last about 5 hours or so after getting up, then she's had it, and down for a 1-2 hour nap. I usually feed her first, so that we can get on a schedule (ish - much less worried about schedules with the 2nd one) of taking a nap AFTER lunch.

She's sleeping through the night too. For the most part.

Here's the crazy thing I've learned about children:

Just when you think you've got a pattern going and you know what you're doing and what your baby needs, EVERYTHING CHANGES. My best advice would be to keep doing what you're doing and follow what your baby is telling you.

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My daughter was about 15 months when she dropped down to one nap. But then, her nap became 3 hrs long, so I didn't complain. I think sometimes when she was learning a new skill, like walking, she fought her naps more. I just took her out of the crib, wore her out for another hour and tried again then. Usually, it worked.

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A few months ago my only child's first nap in the morning went well. At 14 months old, his afternoon nap start later and later and pretty soon his second nap was at dinner time. SO - this presented as the opportunity to push through the morning and start his one daily nap right after lunch. At the start, he would frequently fall asleep during lunch. After a few weeks, he ate more lunches and slept though fewer of them. Now at 21 months old - he is a pro at one long afternoon nap. It lasts anywhere from 1-3 hours and really frees up our time for fun activities. The zoo in the morning is great as is some shopping. Keep up with you and your child's instincts as each child is different and I struggled with this too.

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Our guy went down to one nap at 13 months. Prior to that he took a mid-morning and mid-afternoon nap, but when he switched to one nap it moved to lunchtime. At 2 1/2 he still sleeps immediately after lunch, anywhere from 90 minutes to 2 hours. The minute that he finishes lunch each day, he gets up and heads to the bedroom saying, "Nigh nigh". We feel very lucky.

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Finlay is moving towards one nap (he just turned 11months). He usually gets 1/2 hour at 9.30am, and 2hrs at 1pm. He sleeps 7am til 7pm. He is still breastfed, but only 7am, 2pm and 7pm.

In reality, because of the stinking hot weather we've had here in the UK, I've been giving him an hour in the morning and not enforcing 2hrs in the afternoon, so he can get some sleep whilst it's cooler (it has been 30 Celcius in his room most afternoons, WITH fan). But it has come to bite me on the bum, as he now won't sleep in the afternoon. So I am going to get tough and insist he gets up after 30 minutes in the morning, and gradually shorten that, so he gets 'trained' into sleeping better in the afternoon. I've done it once, and it does work (after some screeching). He does tend to circle the cot with his Rabbit once I put him down, and squawks a little, but settles down on his own once I leave the room.

Finlay has 2 close friends his age here in town, and they are on very similar schedules, give or take 15 minutes. It seems to work very well for all three.

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I think Ian was around 14 months when he switched.

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Apparently my daughter was a freak baby. She was right around four-turning-five-months old when she went down to one nap. It was a three-to-four-hour nap, granted, but who was complaining? Not me! My son was probably around nine months old when he started taking one nap.

Now, I should say that when they were that young, they wouldn't go down for the night until about 9:00 or 10:00 pm. They'd sleep till about 9:30/10:00 am and go down for naps at around 12:30/1:00 pm. It worked amazingly well for us, especially considering that I am not and have never been a morning person.

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David was about at the year mark or maybe a little after...it coincided with the bottle to cup transition and then walking. He was only sleeping 30-45 minutes in the morning, so, that's how I knew it was time to go to one. I took a suggestion from my mom, which was to make lunch at 11:00 one day, then push it back 15 minutes each day. Within a week, he was taking naps at 2:00 PM successfully. Now, things are different now, but I think they do change over time. He now naps at Noon-2...since he is at school and he gets up at 6:30 each day. Just be flexible and trust your gut!

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I find it highly amusing that you actually pay attention to this nap thing...I have three children...they sleep when they want --my oldest who is 17 still takes naps if she can....my six year old takes naps on the weekends and after school if she has had a "rough day" my 9 month old takes naps whenever she wants..what is the drama about naps?????

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Thank you for all of your helpful insights with the exception of Colleen from 7/13 and her criticism of mothers who are more on top of things. It is clear that mothers that pay attention to "the nap thing" merely have different lifestyle needs and there's no "drama" in that, Coleen.

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my little ones started taking one nap a day between 4 and 7 months

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Mine is doing the same, and she's about the same age as Nolan. I'm still waiting for those afternoon naps to stretch out to more than 75 minutes though.

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