Moving to One Nap - Tips

We moved my twin boys to one nap around 15 months because the daycare they were moving to only did one nap - so they weren't exactly willing. However, it worked out well and their afternoon nap became much more consistent and even longer! (Mine were always bad nappers.) Anyway, we would put them down at their regular AM nap time, but wake them up after 10-15 minutes. It's hard to do (we're always told to NEVER wake a sleeping baby) but within about a week they wer down to one nap pretty consistently. They dropped the morning nap because it wasn't worth it and took an afternoon nap between 1-3! It worked like a charm in the end. HTH

My son dropped his at 13 months and the process has been a bit slower. I started by moving the naps up in 30 minute increments every few weeks. I started by moving his 9 AM to 9:30 and so on. He now naps at 11:30 and he is 20 months old. I watch another boy and was able to do the same with him but he occasionally needed a 2nd nap so the transition was a bit harder for him. My son went to bed around 7 in the beginning and now goes to bed at 7:30. I will be done watching this other boy in mid December and when that happens I am going to push my son's nap to 12 and see how that goes. I have heard it is a long process and by the end of all this they should be napping at around 2/3 PM. I pretty much did it cold turkey because my son just refused the 2nd nap. I don't recall how he was in the evening, such as crankiness. Good luck and it is a slow process but isn't too difficult.

We knew it was time for one nap when our son would take his morning nap and sometimes not fall asleep during his afternoon nap (he still laid in bed and rested for about an hour). We learned pretty quickly that he could make it through the morning pretty well with no nap and then was ready to zonk out right after lunch. We tried keeping the morning nap, but by dinner-time he was pure overtired. So, in the end, we landed at a naptime of 1:30pm and he usually sleeps for 2 to 3 hours (he's now 2 1/2). On a side note, our pediatrician suggesting keeping two naps as long as we could. As long as our son would at least lay in bed and have some downtime, the doc said it was better than only one nap. We ended up going to one nap right around 20 or 22 months. As you know, all kids differ, so just follow your gut.

I just followed my kid's lead. We just got real busy i remember one or two days in a row and the kids didn't go to bed right away for their first nap. So, I just took it from there. I saw the opportunity and went for it.

Two naps still?! Wow! My little one hasn't taken two naps a day in a long time, if ever! (She is 19 months old) She was never a sleeper from the time she was born. She used to only take cat naps about 10-15 minutes a few times a day. Now she naps for about 1-2 hours once a day! If they are sleeping like that I would just follow their lead. You don't want them to not get enough sleep and be too sleepy. Just don't lay them down out of habit. Only lay them down if they need it and they will transition themselves! Enjoy your break while they are sleeping!

I agree with going with their lead. My sons were easy to move to one nap. They didn't want to lay down or nap in the morning, so we didn't. My daughter was a little harder because the rest of the kids in her class were still napping twice a day. However, she wouldn't sleep in the afternoon if she slept in the morning. Then she would fall asleep on the way home. It only took a couple of weeks, if that long. (She was only harder for the teachers than me. Her older brother was already on one nap a day.) It sounds like they are ready with taking two short naps.
It is kinda the same with a baby who has their days and nights confused. Just try keeping them up. Since they may be more tired than usual for afternoon nap, I would feed them lunch a little earlier around 10:30/11:00, then lay them down. They should sleep for about the same amount of time, but in one time period. Don't be surprised if they fall asleep while eating. Just feed them the rest or a snack after they wake up.
It really isn't hard to do and it is nice your mom when you have 3 hours straight to get something done instead of 2 1-1 1/2 hour time slots to do it.

You don't say what time the kids go to bed at night or what time they get up in the morning, but adjusting those times or moving the morning nap to a later time might help you to consolidate the naps into one longer one. I didn't actually do anything to start my daughter on one nap. I just followed her lead. She wakes up around 6:30 am and she's able to stay up without overtiredness or irritability until 11:30 am - 12:00 pm. Once she started doing that, she started to take one 2 hour nap starting around noon. After her one nap, she can make it happily until about 7:30 pm then it's bedtime.

It depends on how dependent they are on that first nap being early. If they CAN hold out without becoming overtired (fussy and exhausted), I'd just go cold turkey and move it to 12/12:30/1pm, so that they are tired enough to sleep the longer stretch. If they are dependent on that early nap, I'd slowly move it back a half hour at a time. It then gets tricky with dropping the second nap and makes for a long afternoon, but works well if they are very dependent on the morning nap. As you move the morning time back, the length of it should lengthen so they don't need the second nap. Best wishes! :)

My triplets are 17 months (also born June 06) and just switched to one nap a day as well. Believe it or not, in the last month, they sort of did it on their own. I just started noticing that at times when I put them down, they just weren't tired so I just let it happen gradually. Little by little, their morning stretches started lasting longer and longer until morning went to lunch. Now, usually, right after lunch, is when they fall asleep for about 2 hours. The transition period is a little rough because you can't really plan anything. If you're flexible, just go with the flow and you'll be back in a routine in no time at all!

I did it cold turkey ~ just dropped the morning nap and put my daughter down at 11:30 and she would sleep until about 1:30-2:00. And she still went to bed at 7:00-7:15, which is what time she was always going to bed. I would feed her lunch when she woke up because she would get a snack at 10:30.