Monday, December 13, 2010

oh, Ella!

Here is our dilemma lately...if Ella naps in the afternoon, she's up until 10pm at night. If she doesn't nap, she either a) cries, whines and throws herself on the ground from 4pm-7pm or b) falls asleep in odd places when you really don't want her to (i.e. 5:00 at night). Here are a couple of my more recent attempts to keep her up during the day (in hopes of a little kid-free time in the evening).

Exhibit A:

Exhibit B:

In the first photo I had sent her to her room for time-out because she was driving me nuts (product of a no-nap day) and I was trying to make dinner. We went to call her down to eat and Matt found her like this. Hilarious, but bedtime was no fun that night.

The second picture just happened today - again I am trying to keep her up so she'll go to bed on time for me tonight (Matt always works late on Monday nights and it helps my night if I can get all three kids down by 7:30 or so). I told her she could watch a movie, things got eerily quiet, and when I went to check on her, there she was, out cold. It's only 2:00 in the afternoon and I can actually hear snoring as I type this.

Anyone out there have any ideas for bridging this nap/no-nap phase? We went through it with Dylan too but it didn't seem to be quite as difficult with him (and it didn't last this long). Help!

3 comments:

  1. this just adds another facet to her already wonderful personality!

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  2. My suggestion would be to actually try to have her nap (or have some "quiet time") earlier than when she would nod off on her own. Anytime between right after she is done with lunch and about 30 minutes later. Let her sleep for no longer than an hour and, as awful as this part might be, get her up.

    It sounds (looks) like she needs a little extra sleep to get thru until bedtime but not too much. Moving the nap up and limiting it's length should help with this. Also, move bedtime up a little if necessary and really enforce it - even if she did nap and is fighting to stay up.

    Good luck to you! Try to keep smiling and keep a camera nearby - at the very least she is giving you lots of adorable and funny photo ops. :)

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  3. We JUST went through this with Abbie. She would sleep in the afternoon, be up until 10 or later, and then spend the next day with bags under her eyes. Here's what we did and it's working wonderfully!
    We moved her nap time up to 12:30 (from 1) and wake her no later than 2. It took a few days for her to respond well to be awakened (we've always lived by the principle of 'never wake a sleeping baby'), but now she's adjusted and is in bed asleep by 7:30. We're 2 weeks in and it took about 3 days for her to adjust. And, extra bonus, because she's not 'too tired,' she sleeps in until 7:30 or 8.

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