At almost 4 1/2 years old, my girls are still fabulous nappers. It's genetic. At almost 35 years old, I am a fabulous napper too! However, over the Christmas holiday it became more and more apparent that if the girls took their afternoon nap, their 8:00 bedtime stretched into a 9:30 bedtime. This worked perfectly fine for us when we didn't have any alarm clocks waking us up in the morning.
Now that work and preschool are back in the mix, we've begun a painful new routine on Sundays which involves NO NAP so that the girls go right to sleep at bedtime and are fairly bright-eyed when I wake them up for preschool on Monday morning. There really is no "routine" to our Sundays other than think of every possible way to keep the girls happily occupied and not clawing each others eyes out so that everyone survives and mommy doesn't start drinking at noon just to maintain a little sanity.
Bedtime for the girls is at 7:00 on Sunday.
Since today is a holiday...it is our Sunday. The girls are happily occupied watching their Tinkerbell movie as I type. Next up is a game of Candyland (insert maniacal laughter here). Playing a game of Candyland with three 4-year olds can be about as fun as poking your own eye out with a pencil. I'll try my best not to fall asleep sitting up as we play because I missed my nap today too.
Only three hours until bedtime. But who's counting?
Monday, January 18, 2010
To Nap Or Not To Nap
Labels:
brave mama,
naptime,
preschool
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11 comments:
4.5 and still napping. I must say, I am jealous. Hayden quit napping long ago. *sigh* But my triplets are not allowed to give it up, ever! ;)
Ha I feel the same way about candy land. My girls don't nap on days they have school because they go at 12:30 and get home at 5:00, so Saturdays are a day we do nothing because it we do the girls melt down the whole time.
I wish my girls continues with their nap (is my spare time,ha). Hope everything goes well and the new routine works.
My girls also received a Candy Land for Christmas and love it.
Have a nice week.
I can't exactly recall the last nap that Eliza (soon to be four) took outside of a long car ride or stroller ride. Given this sketchy nap schedule, I can tell you I am far more likely to have Eliza in bed at 8 pm on the no-nap days than on the nap days. She is still holding strong at only 50 nights of uninterrupted sleep since leaving the NICU, but hope springs eternal!
ha ha - my kids have been napless an in bed and sleeping by 7 pm for years!!! You will learn to love - LOVE the early bedtime!!
My kids have all given up naps before their 2nd birthday. But they hit the sack early. Do you know how many days I have wanted it to be bedtime before 9 am???
I miss those early days, too.
AND, LOOK at you! I LOVE your new do. How long has it been done?
My boys gave up napping like 2 years ago. Sigh. :) If I let them nap they are up WAY too late at night.
My twins would nap even now. They love naps (as did I love their napping). We had to stop last year because bedtime was a nightmare. They were not tired at all. Now they fall asleep as soon as their head hits the pillow. They still struggle to skip naps, especially Sydney and fall asleep in the car etc.. but on those days bedtimes are hard again. I miss nap time sooo very much but its not worth it anymore.
I am laughing out loud at your candyland analogy..seriously still laughing picturing you trying to survive the game to the end:)..hopefully no pencil in hand!
We dropped our nap just around 4-4.5 years old. Because although YES, they would nap, I couldn't cope with the 9PM bedtime.
I'd prefer to have a little more crazy during the day and put kids to bed who will fall PROMPTLY to sleep by 7PM. Sometimes, they're down for the night at 6:30. Yes! Yes! It's TRUE!!
Of course an early bed time prompts and early wake up time. Our kids are typically awake by 6:30. And I'm usually not, because most nights I'm up until 1AM. But that's a different story...
We are big nappers in our house. There are many a day when I nap right along with the girls if I am home. I am a girl who likes sleep as are my girls. We have noticed a slight shift in their bedtime time too :( But I am not sure I am ready to give up that nap.
You made me laugh so hard when you wrote about Candyland. I have come to realize I do not like to play games with my 3 year olds. It drives me crazy. And we also got Candyland for Christmas :)
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