sleep is a wonderful thing..

it really is! Whether you are like me and need a solid 8 or 9 hours at night, or like Brian, who can easily function during the day on just 6 hours, sleep is great! Before Madelyn was born I was hopeful she'd like her sleep like me but so curious of how the transition would go for all of us and adjusting to such little sleep in the beginning. I think it's safe to say, without jinxing it at this point, Madelyn is a great sleeper - phew! We are very lucky no doubt but I have to credit the one and only book I've read since becoming pregnant with helping us understand the importance of sleep for babies!

Happy Sleep Habits, Happy Child is a great book about understanding the needs of your baby, their sleep patterns, etc and I am SO thankful we were given a copy - thank you Krissy! I haven't even read the whole book yet but I've taken a few important tips away from it. One tip that I recently started living by was that every baby has 2 hours of good wakefulness in them at a time. Once Madelyn has been up for 1.5 - 2 hours I put her in her crib. Especially for her naps during the day, she is always awake when I put her down and within 15 - 20 minutes she puts herself to sleep :) Before this she'd been falling asleep in her swing, or on me (which is amazing) but she would always wake up upon moving her and never sleep for very long. According to the book, a nap less than 1 hour doesn't actually count as a nap -so Madelyn really wasn't getting the sleep she needed. Now, in her crib, she'll take 2 or 3 hour naps and wake up SO happy! Paying attention to how long she's been awake and when she starts to shows signs of being tired means that we've automatically fallen into a schedule. This also helps Madelyn get to sleep before she's overtired and avoiding that means we're all a bit happier :) Amen!