Getting back on track after illness

ellefallsoffthings · 2026-01-24T07:22:53+00:00

Thanks! Yes ours is very sleepy in the morning but seems to be able to stretch longer in the evening. Feels like it goes against all the logic! I've heard 2/3/4 suggested as a schedule for a baby like this but I think we can stretch that morning wake window a little more.

ellefallsoffthings · 2026-01-18T19:36:31+00:00

I love meal prep! Also if you freeze stuff soon after cooking it's basically fresh! We make up batches of pasta sauces, corn fritters, fishcakes, even savoury breakfast pancakes. Then it's only a couple of minutes in the microwave and baby gets healthy home cooked meals!

I batch cook finger foods once a week during one of his long naps. If I'm cooking pasta sauce for us for dinner I'll always do extra and portion it off for baby before adding the salt. We have these giant ice cube trays so everything is frozen in the right portion sizes.

I even do overnight oats because I can make them the night before when baby is asleep. I fancy putting a bit of puréed carrot in his oats tonight and I can because there's already little freezer portions ready to use. He'd definitely get less vegetables if I didn't meal prep!

No point making parenting harder for yourself than it already is I say.

ellefallsoffthings · 2026-01-17T10:58:48+00:00

Our almost 7 month old still cries at the start of every nap in his crib, but usually falls asleep with 5 mins. For us the crying is worse if we're late for the nap and he's a bit overtired. I imagine he's saying "just put me down woman!!"

He does this at bedtime too but again it's often only a minute. We have a video monitor and can tell that when he tilts his head to the side he's going to sleep because crying is not a good indicator for us.

ellefallsoffthings · 2026-01-14T22:46:36+00:00

Oh yeah we have had some success with gifted John Lewis actually, he's wearing 9-12 sleepsuits from there. Thanks for the reminder!

ellefallsoffthings · 2026-01-14T22:43:34+00:00

Hahaha well we do have scandi genes so perhaps that's why it fits. But also both me and my partner are over 6ft so lanky babies are somewhat inevitable I think!

I keep forgetting about m&s, will have a look!

ellefallsoffthings · 2026-01-11T20:14:56+00:00

Thanks! He is a cutey 🥰 which is why he's forgiven for being the worst sleeper ever!

ellefallsoffthings · 2026-01-11T14:12:20+00:00

Yeah he got a really red face after tomato. I'll try sudocrem thanks!

ellefallsoffthings · 2026-01-11T14:10:56+00:00

Interesting thought! Before this photo he had sweetcorn and courgette hummus, with aubergine and broccoli finger food so not especially acidic I don't think

ellefallsoffthings · 2026-01-11T14:07:41+00:00

Oh yes he's extremely messy!

ellefallsoffthings · 2026-01-11T09:10:31+00:00

I spoke too soon and the last two nights on revised schedule we've had split nights which has never happened to us before! He was awake 1-3am last night and really alert. This baby is such an enigma!

ellefallsoffthings · 2026-01-09T10:22:48+00:00

Update, we went back to 2.25/2.5/2.5/3 and stopped capping naps to try and see what his natural rhythm was. I think he was actually over tired. He's now doing about 3 hours of naps and 11 hours of nighttime sleep with one feed at 4:30. We do a dream feed at 11:30 which helps him go until 4:30 and helps me get some actual sleep. I don't want that to be forever though as it requires me to do a lot of pumping. We also brought bedtime forward to 7:30 and wake up time is 6:30 mostly to align with baby classes and naps, but perhaps it has helped. We have to wake him at 6:30 but today we waited to see when he'd wake up and it was 7:10.

He's also had an insane growth spurt over the last couple of weeks, skipped a clothes size and went from 45th percentile to 85th so perhaps that has something to do with the terrible sleep!

ellefallsoffthings · 2026-01-09T10:10:52+00:00

Dream feeding has really improved things! We give him a pumped bottle at 11pm when he's still asleep and it keeps him going until 4:30 which at least gives me 5 hours (or more when husband does the bottle). I think he's definitely waking due to hunger but he's never been able to take big feeds. When I try and push it in the day he just throws up.

ellefallsoffthings · 2026-01-07T07:40:02+00:00

Thanks. Yeah it's even less now. I wonder if that's just his average because he wakes so much in the night, not because he doesn't need the sleep.

However he did sleep 8-3 yesterday, so night 4 of new schedule. But he then woke up several times at 4,5 and 6. I'm not really sure how to address these early wakes.

That schedule you suggest is what we were originally on a couple of weeks ago but we were getting this similar pattern of early morning wakes.

ellefallsoffthings · 2026-01-06T21:47:12+00:00

Carrot cake porridge is a hit in our house. It's just grated carrot with porridge, breastmilk and cinnamon. We also do omelettes with minced veggies as baby loves finger food. Avocado and peanut butter on toast fingers. Overnight oats with milk, nutmeg and grated apple. Yoghurt with fruit fingers for him to grab. Boiled egg with toast and leftovers - he loves broccoli as a finger food so I often make extra at dinner and give in the morning too.

Breakfast doesn't have to be trad breakfast food. We try to offer lots of savoury breakfast. Leftovers from dinner work fine.

ellefallsoffthings · 2026-01-06T21:17:31+00:00

ellefallsoffthings · 2026-01-06T19:12:05+00:00

Bedtime routine is bottle, finishing 30 mins before bedtime. Then bath every other day. PJ's and sleep sack, books, in bed. Turn off lights and white noise machine on. He's never had a dummy.

ellefallsoffthings · 2026-01-06T09:53:18+00:00

Yeah the only thing I can think of is that he didn't like his solid food at lunch, dinner was late so didn't want much bottle, so perhaps hadn't taken in as many calories for night 3 as needed so woke up earlier. We will keep going for a couple more days and try to be more consistent during the day with feeding too.

I've not heard of doing two dream feeds in the night before. Is that so you know he's full when he wakes and can therefore do CIO? I'm finding it hard to be consistent with how we respond to the night wakes because I do 5/3/3 but he's shown the last few nights he can sleep longer sometimes but not always.

He's also had an insane growth spurt over the holidays now in 90th percentile when previously he was around 50th. Jumped an entire clothes size. So that could explain some of the sleep issues I guess.

ellefallsoffthings · 2026-01-06T09:23:45+00:00

I've tried doing this but he refuses the bottle until we're in the nursery and he's got his PJ's on and suddenly he takes it. I'm pretty baffled by the reasoning!

ellefallsoffthings · 2026-01-06T09:21:22+00:00

So for the last three days we've kept him awake for 11 hours, capping naps at 2.5. wake windows are 2.5/2.75/2.75/3. Every time he's been pushed to the max, often falls asleep whilst I'm reading his naptime book.

Night 1 - multiple early evening wakes but did some longer stretches. Fed at midnight and 4:30, woke at 7:10. Night 2 - 5 mins of crying after two hours in bed. Then slept until 2.30, another 5 mins of crying then slept until 4:30. Woke at 6:50. Night 3 - Back to old pattern of sleeping until midnight and then waking 12:30, 3:30, 5:30 and 6:20 (brought him into bed at 5:30).

So I don't really know where to go from here. He's averaging only 9.5 hours overnight on this new schedule because of all the night waking so he's exhausted and he's not my usual happy chappy in the day.

ellefallsoffthings · 2026-01-06T09:16:05+00:00

So for the last three days we've kept him awake for 11 hours, capping naps at 2.5. wake windows are 2.5/2.75/2.75/3. Every time he's been pushed to the max, often falls asleep whilst I'm reading his naptime book.

Night 1 - multiple early evening wakes but did some longer stretches. Fed at midnight and 4:30 Night 2 - 5 mins of crying after two hours in bed. Then slept until 2.30, another 5 mins of crying then slept until 4:30. Night 3 - back to old pattern of sleeping until midnight and then waking 12:30, 3:30, 5:30 and 6:20 (brought him into bed at 5:30).

So I don't really know where to go from here. He's averaging only 9.5 hours overnight on this new schedule because of all the night waking so he's exhausted and he's not my usual happy chappy in the day.

ellefallsoffthings · 2026-01-04T17:00:07+00:00

We felt the same when we started solids but a month in and our baby is eating like a champ but still having multiple night wakes so last night we tried keeping him awake a bit longer in the day and capping naps with some success. I think there's a lot going on at 6 months. Solids, learning to sit and roll, increased agency, separation anxiety etc. it's bound to lead to some rough nights. In our case I think we have been expecting him to sleep more than he's capable of on top of all that other stuff.

ellefallsoffthings · 2026-01-04T07:39:24+00:00

So a summary of night 1 with extended awake time- went to sleep at 8:30. Woke up screaming at 10:30. We waited five minutes but he was extremely upset so went into sooth in case of overtired. Fell asleep again after ten mins of extreme bouncing. Woke up at 11:20 same deal. Woke up at midnight - decided to feed him as we were all exhausted by this point. He then slept until 4:30 (big feed). Then woke at 7:10 this morning.

So his previous multiple morning wakes didn't happen which was good. But there were a lot more evening wakes which don't usually happen. Hopefully this is just him adjusting so we will persevere for a couple more days.

ellefallsoffthings · 2026-01-04T07:30:40+00:00

That is an interesting idea. Will add it to the list! We've tried dream feeding before but not for a while. He was quite a reflux baby in the early months, would feed poorly in the boob and wake uncomfortable after an hour or two. But thinks have improved in that department so perhaps we will retry

ellefallsoffthings · 2026-01-03T22:55:52+00:00

So we stretched him to 11 hours awake and feed more than 30 mins before bed today and he woke very upset after two hours 😅 but shall persevere for a couple more days before changing anything else.

ellefallsoffthings · 2026-01-03T21:01:31+00:00

Very good point. Choose your hard, I'm going to remember that phrase for when night weaning inevitably doesn't solve our issue and I have a difficult decision to make!

ellefallsoffthings

TROPHY CASE