Hellobee Boards

You can try but my experience is that other than eat-play-sleep, you'll find yourself drifting very much from the AP philosophy.

I found DD fell into her own 3 nap schedule around 5 mo. Before 3 mo trying to establish any kind of order just lead to frustration for me. Some babies are more flexible though.

Attachment parenting is, in my opinion, not very compatible with putting your child on a schedule, since AP at that age is all about responding to the child, where a schedule is about trying to get the child to do things on your timetable. Scheduling a baby that young is also (again, in my opinion) just a recipe for stress and irritation when they inevitably don't follow your schedule.

@macintosh: honestly, no. 6 weeks is soo young!! But like others have said, a routine is a good place to start.

I'm not a great fan of schedules but I do think that even newborns can benefit from a gentle routine or rhythm in their day. Just as an example, we do most of our outings and activities in the morning and afternoons are about napping and quiet time. You could also try adding some consistency to your own day which might in turn help your LO develop her own routine (things like having a consistent wake time and meal times).

@macintosh: schedules are generally time based and about watching the clock, routines are more about consistency in conjunction with following baby's cues. For example, a schedule might say put the baby to bed at 3pm (whether baby is tired or not), a routine would involve putting baby to bed in the afternoon when s/he starts to get tired.

Weeks 6-8 were seriously the worst for us. There is so much going on, and so many changes taking place. I agree with trying to set some routines, but I think your inclination to follow your baby's lead at this point is best.

Have you spent some time tracking eating and sleeping times? A pattern might emerge and could help you in planning.

I'm a big fan of schedules, but I do have to say that it doesn't go well with attachment parenting (something that didn't work for our family). At that time, DS was eating every 3-4 hours, and we did wake to feed, play, sleep, wake to feed. I didn't want him depending on feeding to go to sleep. The schedule above worked well for our family.

@macintosh: By attachment parenting do you mean that you want to nurse to sleep? If so then you won't be able to the EASY routine because Eat and Sleep have to be separated. This is done so that the baby doesn't rely on nursing to fall asleep. But you might be able to do Activity then Eat then Sleep. Whatever you choose, the key to having a routine is to be consistent so that baby learns to predict what's next. I think you have to decide if you will nurse to sleep or not and then based on that, decide what kind of routine you will have.

Exactly what @Kemma: said. At 6 weeks we were definitely in a routine, not a schedule, and I could sorta predict his day based on when he woke up that morning. So I knew for sure I couldn't go anywhere at a certain time because whether he was just starting a nap or smack in the middle, he'd be asleep at that time.

In a sense, at 9 months I still don't have him on a total "schedule". I don't have set nap times, but they do average out out to the same time. I know roughly when he'll take naps but that can vary by a half hour in either direction - based on his morning wake time, etc. His bottles are totally on a schedule but even that can occasionally vary based on naps (If he has a particularly bad morning his nap may be pushed which means I have to give him a bottle 30 mins early so that he can sleep through his normal bottle time. For example!)

I have a nanny 2 days a week and I basically did the following at that age:
1) informed her of wake time each day because that sort of sets the tone for the day
2) told her the max amount of time he should spend awake (at 6 weeks it was definitely no more than 1.5 hours, often less)
3) gave her bottle times (we were mostly feeding on demand at that age but it started to set into a pattern around then of every 3-3.5 hours.
4) most importantly, told her that despite the guidelines above I trusted her to make judgement calls. I told her I prefer she didn't go BEYOND the time limits I outlined, but earlier or later by 15 minutes was ok if she felt it was ok.

It was extremely hard to let go of the reigns at that age and let someone else make judgement calls. But I think it helped her gain confidence and understanding in my sons needs. So today I have total trust in her. Sure, I still think I know better But what mom doesn't?!?