baby's schedule

[petesgirl]

I have an 8 month old boy who has never really been on a good eating/sleeping schedule. He is extremely curious ans strong willed and has fought sleep since about 4 weeks of life.
I also did on-demand nursing so he is a 'snacker' now. When he is up, he will take 1-2 oz from a bottle then he rolls over and crawls away. He won't eat if we are holding him, except for nursing but I don't have much milk anymore. He takes some solids but he always gets super gassy after them that I try to limit solids. But he loves picking up cheerios with his fingers, so I let him have those quite often.

Anyway, I would love to get him on a good schedule of eating and sleeping at the same times everyday but I have no idea where to start. So--I thought if some of you wonder-moms that have babies near his age could post their schedules, maybe that would give me an idea. Please post with as much detail as possible! And any advice about how to teach him a new schedule would also be appreciated!

TIA!!

[Philly Mom]

I have a 7 month old who is an eater and who we have had to train to nap well during the day. This is her daycare schedule which may apply to you more since she sleeps less at daycare then at home. We feed her 4 oz around 7:30 before drop off. She has breakfast at 9 at daycare which consists of fruit mixed with oatmeal. She naps around 10-10:45/11. She has a 4 oz bottle when she wakes up. At around 12:30 or 1, she has lunch. Lunch is yogurt, a vegetable,a fruit, and oatmeal. She has another bottle of 4 oz around 2 or 2:30. 15-30 mins after the bottle, she goes down for another nap. She is up by 4. She has another 4 oz sometime between 4:30 and 5:15. She has dinner at home at six which is similar to what she had at lunch. Finally, she has her last bottle right before bed at 7. She does not have a regimented schedule and if she is asleep, I let her sleep through meals. However, this is pretty close to what we follow everyday and the approximate times of when she gets hungry.

[Minnifer]

After my DD was too old for this to be useful, I read (on the askmoxie site - very useful info there about sleeping/eating etc) that many babies settle into a 2-3-4 routine based on their own body rhythms - so, first nap 2 hours after getting up for the day, 2nd nap 3 hours after the end of the 1st nap, and bedtime 4 hours after the end of the 2nd nap. I kept this in mind w/my DS (who will be 9 months this week) and tried to time his naps that way and lo and behold it has worked, although he tends to be more of a 2-3-3 kind of guy for now. My DD never napped well so it's nice to have a more consistent sleeper...

So anyway, DS's routine is something like this - up somewhere between 6-7 am, nurse, crawl, play and generally wreak havoc while I get DD ready for preschool, then he'll eat whatever I've made DD for breakfast (foodwise he just eats table food i.e., whatever we're eating - he refused all purees and went straight to regular food). He nurses again a bit before his nap starts at around 9:30 am (I have to push this later than the 2 hour interval b/c of taking DD to school) and he typically sleeps 1.5-2 hours. So, up at say 11:15, then nurse somewhere around 12:30 and then eat lunch. Play, activities, etc., and nurse before 2nd nap around 2:30ish. Up again between 4-5 pm, play, fuss (LOL) and at some point nurse a bit before dinner, which is around 5:30. Bedtime between 6:30-7:30 depending on what time he got up and how long it takes post dinner to start getting everyone ready. He nurses before bed and then still every couple of hours overnight. HTH!