The End of an Era

I've got some bad, bad news, folks.

It appears that my 3.25 year old no longer intends to take naps.

Last month he was napping consistently every other day. Lately it's been every three or four days. It's taken me a while to admit it, but I do believe my little Spike is growing out of naps.

Every time we've had problems with nap time, well-meaning people suggest that maybe Spike is just ready to give it up. But I've been stubborn. I was totally unwilling to give up my afternoon peace and with good reason. Until now it was obvious that Spike still needed his beauty sleep and we have been able to overcome nap obstacles. When he was escaping, we started locking him in his room (don't judge--it keeps him safe!). When he started playing and reading and generally causing a ruckus, we stripped his room of toys and books. And it worked. He slept.

Thank God Spike is not yet putting up a fuss about being put down for a nap. (I still call it "nap time" as opposed to "quiet time" because he does still sleep about one out of every three days and that is still the goal.) When he's not sleeping, he's usually changing his clothes (often into something far too warm for the weather or too tight for his chubbiness! Today it was a too small bathing suit), or banging his feet on the door, or making up stories and songs for his baby. There are those days when he hollers from his room every 15 minutes, but usually he'll stay there for an hour or even two. Again, thank God I still get a little Momma time.

I anticipate that he won't be so easy to keep in his room for a couple hours in the afternoon forever, so....PRAISE THE LORD that I've got him signed up for preschool this year! If I didn't have two and half hours, four days a week of Izey-free time to look forward to, I might go a little crazy.

I was really worried about preschool before this nap boycott started. The timing is weird. He's in the 3:00 to 5:30 session, which used to fall smack in the middle of nap time. And a few weeks ago if he didn't nap, the afternoon was H-E-double hockey sticks for this momma and her posse. I was seriously concerned that he was going to be the terror of the preschool. Now if he doesn't nap, he does need to go to bed earlier, but it's a lot less dramatic than it used to be. Now his preschool timing happens to be quite perfect.

I guess if it's gotta happen, now is not such a bad time. I cannot believe that my Izey-free time is going to be while he's in school as opposed to angelically* sleeping upstairs, but that is a subject for another day.

*Don't laugh. Despite evidence on this blog to the contrary, i.e. despite our various battles over naps, Spike easily went down for three hour naps the majority of the time. Those days just don't make for funny bloggable stories.