Sleeping and Waking up Too Early!

Hey Jen.. i have a 12 mnth old who goes to bed at 7 as well... i give him an early morning nap and then a afternoon nap but i dont let him ever sleep pass 4 so he's tired enough to go to bed at 7. but i wanted to point out is there a train or a paperboy or something that's consisent that time of day.. i know when i moved to my grdprts house for awhile to help out Diego kept getting up at 4 o'clock every morn.. i'm thinking wth!! turns out it was the newspaper delivery boy so i had to put a blanket up over his window to block out the car lights..lol but i'm thinking maybe a snowplow, train.. etc.. n e thing like that.. maybe an airplane that goes off.. something that may not effect us but could be out of the norm for you kid to wake up... i mean you could try to put him to bed later.. but i would maybe not go in the room and see if he falls back to sleep. my son did that for awhile when he was sick, but otherwise he just tried to get me to keep coming in his room b/c he was use to it!! so i had to give him a few days to 'cry it out' and he was fine. i hope all goes well & you figure it out, i know it can be frustrating.. :)

He might just be going through a growth spurt so he's hungrier. I have a 17 month old who wakes around that time to nurse. Throughout the night if she wakes I can usually get her to go back to sleep by other comforts. But then between 4 and 6 am she usually nurses and goes back to sleep IF by the time she's finished nursing, her brothers are not up. If they get up during that time, she will be awake for the next few hours and take a late morning nap. So early in the morning she's rested enough that she could get up, but sleepy enough that she can go back to bed if the conditions are right. I think she just wakes because she's hungry. If you're fine with giving your son a bottle at that time, I would try putting him back to bed with some music playing. Good luck! I hope you get to sleep!

Been there and have done just what your doing. Maybe it is the tooth or his sleep pattern is changing. As long as he is going back to sleep for a while, I'd just continue with your current routine.

It could be the teeth, he could be hungry or he could be learning to manipulate you. He is old enough to eat enough at 'dinner' to last him through the night. The Baby/Toddler 411 books suggest not feeding in the middle of the night and that worked pretty well for us. It was difficult and I spent more than my fair share of nights sleeping on his floor. But we got passed it

It sounds like he's going to bed too early, and his body is adjusting to different sleep patterns/needs.

I'd recommend putting him to bed closer to 8pm with that 5 oz bottle before he falls asleep. if he's consistently taking that bottle, he's hungry. The fact that he's going back to sleep is a good thing, in my opinion. But, he's waking-up because he's hungry - neither of my kids woke-up at that age for hunger.

A 6:30 bedtime is really early - if you can, find something to engage him a little longer to keep him awake longer to see if that helps with the problem.

It could be any number of things. Like you said, the teeting could be bothering him. I would try putting him to sleep about an half hour later for starters. And would definitely not recommend starting the feedings when he wakes up. His stomach can get used to that and then you'll be trying to break another bad habit. I would try coming in to console him but leaving soon after maybe leaving some music on or a soft lamp so he won't he just all alone. We had the same problem with my son. At different ages, he would just wake up before the crack of dawn seemingly for no reason. Usually it would only last for a week or two and then he would go back to normal. Just kind of throws things out of wack for awhile though.