Sleep Routines

For a few months we've been on the same routine/schedule. The girls typically get up and then eat somewhere around 7 am. From there we were doing an eat, play, sleep schedule with them eating every 3 hours. This meant they were also napping 3 times a day for about an hour each time.  Around 7 pm we would start our bedtime routine that included a bath, book, and a feeding before going down. It had been going well until about a week and a half ago when Lucy decided she was going to fight instead of going to bed. 

Some nights for the last feeding she'd nurse well, and other nights she'd refuse altogether. We tried bottles and that seemed to work some, but she was only taking a little bit and then falling asleep. Some nights she wouldn't go to sleep at all. We tried letting her cry but that quickly escalated. I'm just not the CIO type, so that wasn't going to work for us. It seemed she just wasn't tired. This made me reevaluate our schedule and make some necessary tweaks. 

They girls still get up around 7 and eat. They still get solids around 8 and go down for their morning nap around 9:00. They still eat around 10:30. This is where things have changed. After they get up from their morning nap I keep them up 3 hours, feed them, and then put them down for their only afternoon nap that I pray is decent in length. Yesterday they napped an hour and a half and were up around 2:45. From that point on the idea is to keep them up until bedtime. 

With this new routine Lucy is now going to bed at the regular time. There was one day they fell asleep early and didn't nap long so I put them down for a short afternoon nap. This resulted in Lucy not going to bed until around 9 pm. 

So, to sum things up the biggest change is the middle of the day. From when they first wake up they're up 2 hours before their first nap. When they wake up from their morning nap they are up for 3 hours until their next nap. After their afternoon nap we try to keep them up for 4 hours before bedtime. So far it's working much better, although there's definitely been more crankiness with the increased awake time.