Let me preface this by saying we've never kept Henry to a sleep schedule. Whenever he starts acting tired, we put him down for a nap and we let him sleep as long or as little as he wants. The only exception to this is we do try to have him in bed before eight o'clock, just so DH and I can have some quiet time together before bed (usually around nine or ten o'clock).

Yesterday, LO woke up around eight. He had a nap around ten, woke around eleven. He had another nap around one, woke up around three. (I was actually able to sneak a nap in from two to three, it was glorious!) Then he started acting fussy around five thirty. I didn't think anything of it, figured he just needed a cat nap to recharge before playing for a few more hours. So I put him to bed. And waited.

And waited... and waited... and waited. I began to think around six thirty that perhaps I should wake him up but I figured I'd give it a few more minutes. Surely he'd wake up on his own. Then the clock edged toward seven and I started thinking, 'Why wake him now? His normal bed time would be in an hour and I'd never get him back down. Besides, he's sure to wake himself soon!' Oh how wrong I was. My husband got home a little after nine and Henry was -still- asleep. Not only that but he slept through the noise of DH getting his heavy work boots off, taking the baby gate off the doorway (which squeeks really loud), me changing the temperature on our thermostat a few times (loud beeps right next to his bedroom)... In fact, he slept until a little after seven thirty this morning. Without a single peep! Which is unheard of!

He didn't do one of his whimper sleep cries, he didn't rustle in his crib, he didn't wake me for a bottle around midnight or five thirty (which he's been known to do, one or the other), he didn't do anything! He slept for fourteen hours straight!

Now, I realize that there may be some outside factors - the weather (we had a cold front push through last night that gave both DH and I a headache), he could be going through a growth spurt, teething, etc - but has anything this ever happened to you? And did it freak you out? When I woke myself at seven thirty, his usual wake up time, I was starting to panic a little and was about to go wake him up!

Or maybe I'm going about this all wrong and what he really needs is just an earlier bedtime for us to get through the night without waking? What do you think? Do you put your one year old to bed early? Do they sleep through the night without a peep? Am I overreacting? (The answer to the last one is yes, by the way...)