One of our biggest goals when our little girl was born was to ensure she knew the difference between night and day. Because once she knew this, we could work on getting her to sleep throughout the night. It was such a journey but we were able to get our girl, who is now almost 5 months old to sleep 12 hours a night.
First off, we were gifted the most amazing book ever, Twelve Hours’ Sleep by Twelve Weeks Old: A Step-by-Step Plan for Baby Sleep Success. This book became our baby bible. We read it through twice and followed it to a tee. This book helped us understand how to ensure your baby gets enough nutrients during the day so you can sleep train them at night (i.e. let them cry themselves back to sleep).
First, our goal was to get 32 ounces of formula into her by day’s end. This took 4-6 weeks, slowly including more formula to her bottle. We are now at 8-9 ounces per bottle and 4 bottles a day. This now assures us if she does wake up, it’s not because she’s hungry or needs more food. It wasn’t until she was 3.5 months or so that she was consistently drinking her bottle.
Now that we had the feedings under control, we worked on the sleep schedule more thoroughly and our day now looks like the following…
- 6:00 – 6:30am: Wake-Up
- 7:00am: 8-9 oz Bottle Feeding
- 9:00am: 30-45 minute nap (in crib without sleep sack) – She doesn’t always sleep but we still let her lay there to relax, even if she’s screaming
- 11:00am: 8-9 oz Bottle Feeding
- 1:00pm: 45-60 minute nap (in crib without sleep sack) – She doesn’t always sleep but we still let her lay there to relax, even if she’s screaming
- 3:00pm: 8-9 oz Bottle Feeding
- 6:00pm: Bath Time and Bottle Feeding Before Bed (with sleep sack)
We’ve been consistently doing this daily thanks to the quarantine and on a good track for a sleeping baby.
