Megan's 5 Month Sleep Study

Is there anything cuter than a sleeping baby?  Maybe a baby that is now sleeping 10+ hours at night?

Up until a little over 2 weeks ago I was still trying to swaddle Megan to get her to bed.  She had always done such a good job of falling asleep on her own once wrapped up but had really started to fight back.  Bedtimes were no longer fun for me.  John suggested not swaddling her.  I was hesitant since she had always moved around so much which would wake herself up, but I was willing to try.  After a few nights of just swaddling below the arms (above pic), I skipped the swaddle alltogether and now just cover her with tucked-in blanket.

The Tuesday and Wednesday night prior Megan slept 10-10 1/2 hours both nights.  I got really excited to write a post about her sleep.  But, as I've learned from the past, as soon as I write about her sleep (and in this case, only think about it) she starts acting up and proving me wrong.  The Thursday following was awful, with several cryouts and restless sleeping.  This happened a couple more nights too.  I'm assuming i's because she was just over-tired.  The past three nights have been great, however and consistently doing 10-10 1/2 hours each night.  I don't mind one bit!  The only downside is that now Megan's more rested and harder to get back to sleep after the good night's sleep - just means daddy has to get up to watch her earlier so I can get to work.

Naps are harder to get in (or so I've been told) and Megan's not sleeping as long during naptime anymore (maybe just 30 min at a time instead of an hour+).  I'm sure it's because she just wants to play and learn and watch everything around her.  She gets tired in the early evening, but don't want her to nap so close to bedtime so we often try to keep her up.  Bedtime itself is getting earlier.  Since Megan's been moving so much more lately, she wears herself out and just crashes at night.  We've done a handful of 8:30 bedtimes recently where I change her, feed her, and burp her to find her asleep on my shoulder.  With our weird schedules it is hard to commit to 8:30 bedtime, but settle for anywhere between 8:30-9:00, depending on her last nap.  That means she sleeps until after 7am usually!  I enjoy the extra time to sleep and pump peacefully in the morning.

Since we no longer swaddle, Megan is able to move around freely in the crib.  At first I was worried when I saw her sleeping on her tummy, but I think she prefers to have her rear up in the air.  These pics were taken last weekend.  It is not uncommon to put her to sleep in the middle of the crib on her back only to find her at the head of the bed on her tummy in the morning.