Since deciding I was going to lay Little Bug down for a nap twice a day at the same times for 1.5 hours, I have gotten SO MUCH accomplished.

It is important to me that Little Bug get the sleep she needs, but it is also important to me that I have the time in the day to accomplish the tasks I need to get done around the house.

I am first and foremost a wife and mother, but I am also a home-maker and it is important to me that I have blocks of time during the day to take care of the every day tasks that must be done around the house.

I do not want Dave to have to worry about tasks around the house that I can do during the day while he is at work if I manage my time wisely. Dave has his things he does around the house (like taking out diapers and trash and the yard), but since I am a stay-at-home-mom, I feel it is my responsibility to do the cleaning, laundry, etc.. and to do it while he is away at work so that when he comes home we can spend time as a family instead of doing work.

That is why, second to wanting Little Bug to get the sleep she needs, I want naps to happen consistently each day so I know when I have these blocks of time to accomplish tasks around the house.

And I’ll be completely honest and say I also want to know when I have a block of time to do something I enjoy such as blogging :), reading and scrapbooking! Often times mothers feel guilty for wanting some time to do things that they just simply enjoy doing, but I have chosen to realize that I do not need to feel guilty if I sit down to write a blog post while Little Bug naps (as I am doing now :) ) because we need this time to recharge! I admit I cannot go and go and go, especially after chasing a 1-year-old around, and then continue to go and go when she is finally resting herself. Sometimes, this Mama just needs rest too!

Today would be one of those days!

Independent Playtime was another 5 minute (or maybe 4 mins) crying session. There was a brief time that Little Bug stopped the crying but then she was back at the gate…

Work in progress. Work in progress. As soon as that timer goes off I go right in to get her and do the whole clean up routine (as Little Bug then starts to play with her Noah’s Ark that any other time of the day she is just dying to get her little pudgy hands on) and then leave the room.

I am hoping within a week ???? Little Bug will get it. I’ll just keep on keeping on until she does get it. Once we hit that 5 minutes of Independent Play with no crying we will finally be able to move to the next step of increasing the minutes on the timer until we reach our goal of 30 minutes.

I am trying to do IP twice a day (if I am home all day long) so that she will hopefully catch on quicker with more exposure to what happens during IP.

I guess playing 1 out of 5 minutes is progress, right?? A teeny, tiny, baby step towards the ultimate goal.

Switching gears to naptime now…

Yesterday (I think it was) I replied to a comment left by someone that Little Bug has only refused to not nap 1-2 times (if that) when I lay her down to nap.

We can add one more to that count now.

This morning I laid Little Bug down at 10:00. She never cried (seriously, not even a peep when I left the room which has been her standard cry time when I exit the room at naptime since she turned one) but never slept. At 11:15 she started to fuss (which is typically what she does when she lays awake for a little while and then decides to go to sleep finally). I didn’t think she’d go to sleep. I left her for the remaining 15 minutes of naptime and went in at 11:30 to find a sleeping Little Bug!

I woke her little booty up and we continued the day as if she had slept from 10-11:30. I laid her down at 2:30 and (as far as I can hear) all is quiet and she is sleeping.

I never imagined this transition from 2 to 1 nap would be so dramatic! I figured it would be like dropping the 3rd nap was. One day she took it and the next she didn’t!

Not so with this nap!

At least I FINALLY have a game-plan to figuring this out! Picking nap times, being very consistent with naps and taking notes about what she does during naps for a week I think is really going to help me finally get to the bottom of this and decide if we will stick with 2 naps for now or move to one long afternoon nap.

- Elaine