They should come with little instruction booklets.

That way I would know how to make sure this little guy gets enough sleep. I know when he hasn't had enough sleep: he is difficult to put to bed at the end of the day. Lately he's been getting good naps during the day in the sling: a one-hour nap from about 9-10, a two-hour nap from about 11-1, and another two-hour nap from about 3-5. He goes to sleep at night relatively easily when he gets this amount of sleep during the day. Unfortunately, when he's slung I can't take a nap. The fact that I just about lost my mind last night over minor baby issues tells me that this lack of napping is starting to take its toll on me. I need sleep, too.

So now I need to figure out how to get him to take at least one of his two-hour naps without being held against my body. I could get him to sleep in the sling and then lay us both down on the bed, loosen the sling and fall asleep. But when he's next to me like that I don't sleep all that well. I'm constantly feeling his presence and all his little restless movements keep me awake. I could also get him to sleep in the sling and then loosen the sling and slip out of it, laying him down in his crib. Or I could swaddle him, get him drowsy by nursing or rocking or bouncing, and then lay him in his crib and hope he gets himself to sleep.

At night, we're still trying to figure out a bedtime routine that works. We had been bathing, changing, and then nursing off to sleep, but I think we were waiting too long to start the process. He is fussing with a fair amount of gusto by the time we're getting him dressed after the bath and the entire routine loses any relaxation potential it may have held. So we've decided to start the process earlier, when he's fresh, and include a bit of quiet interaction between bath and nursing so that I can get him started toward sleep at the first sign of sleepiness rather than starting the bath at that point.

Ask Moxie (my most favorite-est super-informative parent blog) suggests throwing every sleep technique book into the trash. She also has wonderful readers who offer smart comments that make me realize that perhaps there is no solution except what works on any given day. And then there's this great blog by a developmental psychologist who helped me understand why all of this is normal. But I can't help but try.

He's sleeping in the sling right now, by the way. This afternoon I'll try to get him to sleep with me in the bed, I suppose. We'll see how it all goes.