I've had a bit of a cold or something the whole time we've been up here by Lake Tahoe and yesterday, it kinda caught up with me. We put the kids down for a nap and I decided to lie down for just a bit. I told Rachel I was only going to rest for half an hour, but almost four hours later, Rachel had to wake me up.

Unfortunately, that meant I got nothing done all afternoon. I had planned to do some work and prepare for more fun with the kids and even clean up a bit, but none of that happened. Normally, when I'm on holiday, I use the time (when the kids are napping) to get some work done on some personal projects or do some writing. I keep going full blast just the same as when I'm at work.

Am I alone in this? Do others make use of vacation time as work time? I know a few people who just stay home during their time off and surf the internet or watch movies, and I know others who don't do any work while on holiday -- but they don't have kids and can get stuff done outside of work. But what about other parents? Do you keep burning the candle at both ends or is vacation a chance to snuff one out temporarily?

I miss sleep. Sleep used to be my best friend, always there for me when I needed it, always just around the corner waiting for me.

Then of course I had a baby. All the things they tell you about sleep--basically its disappearance--ring true loud and clear. That business about "sleeping when the baby sleeps" is a good theory but not one that holds much water. If I'd slept when my baby slept in the beginning I wouldn't have been able to freak out over him because I was so afraid he'd stop breathing. If I slept now when my baby sleeps I'd never see what he really looks like--when he's awake he is on the move at lightning speed.

I do try to sleep whenever I can. When he goes to bed at night, between seven and eight, I follow him around nine. This means no late night television or long talks about the future with my husband--we do all that in the morning. When the grandparents arrive, inevitably we turn the baby over to them for an hour and try to take a nap in the other room.

The problem with getting a little sleep is that it's worse than getting none at all. You get a taste of what you're missing and then you really start to feel it. For example, right now, it's the morning and I'm exhausted. I should've had a seamless eight hours or so but had family in town all weekend, crazy weather to deal with and a kid that woke up for no good reason at 2:30 AM.

Then the alarm went off at 5:00 so one of us could go run. It's exhausting! Monday morning, when I wished I'd been sleeping all weekend and now I have a full work week ahead of me with no relaxation in sight.

They're not kidding with this parenthood business when they say you'll be exhausted all the time. It's true. It's worth it, and I wouldn't trade it for the world or go back to the way things were before our son joined us for anything, but I sure am tired.

Thank goodness for Starbuck's venti iced chai lattes with soy.

I'm so very excited. Earlier this year I received an invitation to a friend's wedding, and now that day is upon us. A week from now me, my husband, and, yes, my son, will all be piling into a rental car and heading somewhere in upstate New York to watch her get hitched.

I'm thrilled with the idea of the opportunity to get dressed up in something fancy and celebrate. It's been such a long time since I've been able to do either. Of course, I'm still nervous about my post-baby body--what will I wear? Will anything I owned still fit?--but even more so about how my five and a half month old baby will react to this new situation--one in which, at times, complete silence is required.

My husband has already vowed to take the baby out of the chapel if he makes any noise during the ceremony. I think we'll all be fine, really, since the baby is used to being taken pretty much everywhere we go and likes being around other people. You never know when he might decide to have a meltdown though, like he did last week at the American Museum of Natural History.

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Researchers who apparently have nothing better to do have been studying the napping habits of children and have declared that the afternoon snooze can be harmful to them.

One study involved 27 pre-school children and some puzzles. Researchers found that the kids who took longer naps had more difficulty solving puzzles that required some planning and organizational skills.

Another polled the parents of kids ages 2 to 12 about their children's sleeping habits. The kids who took long naps during the day required more time to fall asleep at night and slept later on the weekends.

I have to wonder about that first group of 27 kids. Were they given the puzzle to solve immediately after waking from their nap? I know that on the rare occasion that I get a nap during the day, it takes me some time to fully recover my mental capacities upon waking. I tend to walk around in a bit of daze for an hour or so.

As for the other study, going to sleep later at night might not be ideal, but I think you would be hard-pressed to find a
parent who didn't appreciate a child who slept later on the weekends.

Ellie hasn't taken an afternoon nap in about 4 years, but I still miss them. Her naps not only gave me some much-needed time to myself, they gave Ellie a chance to re-charge her batteries and lose the cranky attitude that she'd been working on since breakfast. Long live the nap!

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My two year-old son, Devon, is developing and growing by leaps and bounds every single day. Most of the time I welcome the growth, it is such an honor to witness. But one of the changes I have long dreaded is finally here: the disappearance of the nap. Sigh.

Devon's nap is often the time of day when I can catch my breath, get some work done, take a nap of my own or simply sit in the corner and rock back and forth as I dream of a happy place. For the past few weeks it has taken him longer and longer to fall asleep in the afternoons; and if I put him down beyond a certain time, he simply won't fall asleep. Needless to say, this change has brought my often disheveled life to a standstill. At first I was so stressed out about it that I would pace back and forth worrying what sort of damage I was inflicting upon him as he sat in his crib and alternately inquired, loudly, to my whereabouts or sang his songs. But then I realized his noise was not that of a child in pain or fear. It was just his everyday noise contained to the confines of his crib. It dawned on me that he was not hurt, wasn't hungry, not crying.

I am continuing to follow our nap routine of three books, several songs and the tuck-in ritual. I then leave the room. Sometimes he'll make noise for the better part of an hour while I putter about accomplishing my tasks. Other times he prattles on for about 30 minutes, at which point he'll nap for another 30 minutes. In either case, it is not the 90 minute respite I had before, but it is still a break. When did your little one toss aside the nap for other endeavors? How did you cope?

Nolan has never been much of a sleeper, and though I'd love to moan about that endlessly, I've lucked out in so many other facets (eating, temperament) that I just usually nod mutely when other Moms discuss their babies naps.

I was eavesdropping on a conversation of a few Moms at daycare last week, one Mom asking the other whether her daughter had moved from two naps to one.

"Not yet," replied Mom number one,"She usually naps for an hour in the morning and for two in the afternoon."
"Well, Reese only has one three-hour nap in the afternoon, so I can get a lot done," responded Mom two.

And I stuck Nolan's noodle arms into his jacket while he was distracted by Mighty Machines and I wondered, am I the only Mom in the Universe whose child never has a pattern to his nap time? At day care, Nolan naps pretty steadily - two hours in the afternoon. But when he is home with me, he sometimes naps for twenty minutes, and sometimes for three hours. There is never a rhyme nor reason so I can't plan my day. Sometimes he naps twice, sometimes once, and two days in a row are never the same.

I wonder, do other Moms have inconsistent nappers? Or have I not laid the proper foundation by allowing Nolan to tell me when he's tired? Who knew sleeping could be so complex?

Sometimes the first thought on my mind when I open my eyes in the morning is, "I can't wait until the next time I can go back to sleep." This train of thought has nothing to do with a depression or distaste for life, but rather the fact that I just don't feel like I can ever get enough sleep. My 2 year-old slumbers in his crib from about 7 p.m. to 6 a.m. Once he goes to sleep then it is time to tend to the older children. Once they are in bed, by about 9 or 9:30 p.m., then I feel entitled to some time to myself. Sometimes this span of time stretches and I end up getting far less sleep than I need before the whole grind begins again the next morning.

Now that I work from home, I can sometimes catch a quick nap during Devon's afternoon sleep time. But is this a good idea for an adult? According to some folks at the Mayo Clinic an afternoon nap is a good thing if you awake refreshed and ready for the remainder of the day. A nap that lasts between 30 and 60 minutes is a beneficial recharger for the body; anything longer could upset the body's internal clock and disrupt night time sleep patterns.

I prefer my afternoon naps to last somewhat longer and I don't always awaken refreshed and ready to face the rest of my daily duties. But maybe I can limit the next nap to an hour and go to bed earlier. What about you? Are you a napper?

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Now that Nolan is starting to sleep a little better through the night (knock on wood, pinch salt, pull dog's tail and pray that writing about it will not disrupt it) his nap schedule seems a little thrown.

Actually, he never had a nap schedule, per se.  When I saw him rubbing his eyes or performing "the triangle" (wherein he wrenches his body away from me in an obstinate and gravity-defying triangular shape), I'd simply breastfeed him until he fell asleep.  This all occurred at random and haphazard times. I know.  It is the exact opposite of what I probably should be doing but I am beginning to think that in this parenting gig, you grip on to whatever is solid and never ever let go.

But he seems a lot less tired now. And I can't get him to take his second nap, he just circles around his crib and attempts to play peek a boo for ten minutes until he realizes I'm not responding and then his lip quivers and his world crushes and the screaming begins.

Last night I googled "when does baby move from two naps to one" and I came up with very little.  I know babies are all very different, but it would be helpful to have a general consensus: when did your baby move from two naps to one?  I have the feeling Nolan is a little young for the one brief nap per day that he's been taking.

For the past two winters I have worked part time at a ski resort nursery. We get children from all over the nation and quite a few from around the world. With the many different times zones the mothers are often adamant about the sleep schedules of their infants and toddlers. However, when you have anywhere from five to fifteen children it is difficult to maintain the sleep demands of so many different time zone schedules. Most of the staff members were young ladies from New Zealand or Argentina who were working during their summer breaks. These girls would often roll their eyes in frustration when the mothers would rant about our inability to maintain the children's nap schedules, and for good reason in some cases when the mothers became a bit crazed -perhaps due to their own unmet sleep schedules. And while I agreed that  the rudeness was undeserved, I do understand about the sleep schedule.

We had no set nap routine for our first two children, they napped when the mood hit -albeit not nearly often enough for me, and went to bed when I could get them there. I always read to them regardless of the time, but I was much younger and time did not really seem to matter as much. Such is not the case with our third child, Devon. He is on such a set schedule that I plan most of my days around his naps. When his routine gets interrupted, as happened with a recent trip to the in-laws, my life gets topsy turvy while I try to transition him back into his routine. He is cranky, more finicky than usual and I feel the evergrowing need to find a day spa to rest my weary head. It is at these times that I go back to our sleep bible, Sleep Baby Sleep, by Tammy Hussin, and brush up on the nap chapter. It is the only book we have ever tried and, luckily, it has worked great for us. I would be curious what other books or methods readers use or find helpful, please feel free to share your thoughts.

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Everything in my house, and I mean everything, revolves around naptime. When I just had one child, I lived for naptimes because it meant that I could clean up during morning nap, and then...um...sleep during afternoon nap. When my daughter dropped her morning nap, the house was a little messier and I was a little more tired, but naptime was still me time.

Now I have two children.  When the younger was around two months old, we "gently encouraged" her to follow her older sister's sleep schedule. 'Cept now, her older sister doesn't nap anymore.  As type this "Bunny," my three-year old, is sitting on the floor of the living room next to me eating a sandwich and watching a movie. In the past we've stuck to limiting television to 30 minutes a day, but I still need time to work and get things done (laundry, getting dinner started) during naptimes. Therefore, I've been allowing "Bunny" to watch a movie on certain afternoons.

How do you handle this situation? What do you when one kid naps and one doesn't, but you still need to get things done? (Craft or creative project ideas most welcome!)