We started today...and I'm hoping to continue it as much as possible. Obviously it will require some modification when there are events and such, but I think we'll be able to stay pretty close to it. At the moment Leah can only be awake for about an hour at a time in the morning and about 2 hours at a time in the afternoon without getting overtired. But as that changes we'll modify the schedule accordingly. In a couple of months it ought to be more of a morning nap, midday nap, afternoon nap - at the moment it's a lot more naps than that.
7:00 a.m. wake-up, then diaper change, then feeding, then play, then start getting down for a nap by about 7:45
8:00 a.m. morning nap - at the moment she only naps about 30 minutes, but I'd like to try to stretch that to about an hour - so I'll be trying some different techniques to get that going
9:00 a.m. wake-up, then diaper change, then feeding, then play, then start getting down for a nap by about 9:45
10:00 a.m. 2nd morning nap - hopefully an hour
11:00 a.m. wake-up, then diaper change, then feeding, then play, then start getting down for a nap by about 11:45
12:00 p.m. midday nap - she usually sleeps a couple hours midday
2:00 p.m. wake-up, then diaper change, then feeding, then play, then start getting down for a nap by about 3:45
4:00 p.m. afternoon nap - hopefully an hour
5:00 p.m. wake-up, then diaper change, then feeding, then play, then start getting ready for bedtime routine by about 6:00
6:15 p.m. bedtime routine - bath, then feeding, then massage and dress for sleep (including swaddle), then read a book, then put to sleep
7:00 p.m. bedtime
So the various daytime activities can be modified a bit when we go out for walks or to mom groups or shopping or whatever else. But the morning wake-up and bedtime need to be constant. And the bedtime routine needs to be constant so that she knows it's time to be down for the night. Hopefully in a month or so she will have at least gotten down to 1 night feeding if not giving it up altogether. And maybe by then she'll be putting herself to sleep on her own - but if not - I think we'll try Ferberizing.
Today I tried to follow this schedule. She naturally woke up at 7:00 this morning and we were pretty much on schedule for the morning, although sometimes I had trouble getting her to sleep and she certainly didn't nap for an hour at a time - more like 30 minutes. So for the remaining time I tried holding her and rocking her - still in her room with the lights off and the white noise on. And when she got tired of that and started to fuss I unswaddled her and put her in the crib with the mobile on.
Then when she went down at noon she slept until just after 3:00. I thought she would only sleep for 2 hours, but I'm definitely of the belief not to wake a sleeping baby unless you absolutely have to. So I guess she was making up for her morning naps being too short. Then after a diaper change and feeding we went out to babies-n-beer in boerum hill - about a 30 minute walk from here. She stayed awake the whole time, so she really didn't have an afternoon nap. But I guess since she had slept so long midday she didn't really seem to be overtired. She did nod off at the breast when I fed her around 5:00, but when I moved her into the stroller to head home she woke right up and stayed awake the whole way home. But the timing was good. We moved right into her new bedtime routine and it worked out perfectly. She fussed a little in the bath and a lot while I dried her off after. But then the feeding calmed her right down and she was calm for a little massage. Although once we got her dressed and swaddled she was not interested in sitting for a book - so Shafi put her to sleep. She was asleep by about 7:00 and Shafi held her until about 10 after to be sure she was in a deep sleep. It's now 7:45 and she's still sleeping soundly. I'm hoping she'll go until 1 a.m. so that she'll only need 1 night feeding, but we'll see.
Once we see how this routine goes for a few days if she's doing more than 1 night feeding I'll experiment with giving her a feeding just before I go to bed while trying to keep her as asleep as possible for it. But if she'll do 1 night feeding on her own then I won't mess with that.
I think one key thing is going to be to try to keep the routine on weekends too. I find that she's fussier early in the week and I think it's because the weekends mess her up. We'll see how it goes.
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