Schedule and routine for a 16-17 week old newborn baby. Get info on this baby’s daily schedule and routine for each day and know how to structure your day.
This is a summary for McKenna age 16-17 weeks old. Things seem to be smoothing out; it seems that there are fewer changes from week to week, so these posts might not be all that interesting 🙂 But I am continuing on because many of you have asked that I do.
Post Contents
NURSING
As I stated last week, McKenna started off the week taking a bit longer to eat. After a few days of this, she went back to taking about 5-10 minutes per side. She is eating well. She is staying awake for her feedings without any effort on my part.
GROWTH SPURT
I am pretty sure she had a growth spurt at the beginning of this week. She added a feeding to her day the first day of this week. She then ate pretty much as usual after that.
WAKETIME LENGTH
Waketime length stayed the same as last week.
NAPS AND SIBLINGS
My husband took Brayden and Kaitlyn camping to the lake over the weekend. A bunch of friends were going up. I decided to stay home because the campsite is about a quarter to a half mile from the beach. While it is in viewing distance, I didn’t feel comfortable leaving McKenna to sleep while I went to the beach, and sitting by myself up at the campsite didn’t sound all that thrilling to me :). While they were gone, McKenna slept like a champ. She had no siblings to wake her at her transitions.
When Brayden was a baby, we lived next to a family with 8 young children. They played right by his bedroom window all day. For a while, he woke at every transition. After some time, however, he learned to sleep through it. At first, the noise of Brayden and Kaitlyn didn’t bother McKenna. She is now at an age where she gets curious by their noises. She usually goes back to sleep quickly with without crying (just mad talking), but she still wakes sometimes. With them gone, she slept soundly through each nap.
My policy with the family is that they can make normal living noises, but they can’t yell like they are outside. We have indoor voices and outdoor voices. We use them appropriately. I don’t want Brayden and Kaitlyn to not be able to live life as usual, but they still need to have respect for McKenna while she is asleep and speak in our inside voices. They really get it. We were at the park one day this week and there was a sleeping 4 month old. Kaitlyn said, “I am supposed to be quiet?”
Read: Older Children While Baby Naps
NIGHTTIME
This week, she started waking around 5:30-600 again. Since I suspected a growth spurt, I fed her and figure she will go back to extending nights soon. She also is very hot when she wakes up at that time, so I am wondering if stopping the swaddle will help with that when the time comes.
BOTTLEFEEDING
Remember my bottle feeding problem? It is gone. I don’t really know why. I only feed her once a week from it. For a couple of weeks, she wouldn’t eat more than two ounces. Then she ate well from it the last two times I gave it to her (the week of 16-17 weeks and the week of 17-18 weeks, which she just started). I will mention that I use the Adiri Natural Nurser. This seems to be easy for McKenna to use back and forth. Her issue was never about latching on and sucking–it was a preference issue.
SWADDLING
I decided to try to drop the swaddle cold turkey one day this week. I figured I could try it before the disruptions came. If it worked, great. If not, we would go back to it. I also figured I could swaddle her for camping even if she wasn’t swaddled normally anymore. I tried it one nap and she had a hard time falling asleep, so I decided against it. I think when I go for it again, I will do one arm out first rather than cold turkey. I just don’t see a need to disrupt sleeping to drop the swaddle.
OUR SCHEDULE
It went back:
5:30-6:00 AM–eat from one side
8:00 AM–wake and eat
8:50 AM–nap
11:00 AM–eat
12:00 AM–nap
2:00 PM–eat
3:00 PM–nap
4:30 PM–eat
5:45 PM–nap
7:00 PM–eat and straight to bed
10:00 PM–dreamfeed
OUTINGS/EVENTS
Most outings and events don’t seem so eventful now that McKenna is older. We did things like go to the park and visit friends, but it doesn’t seem so eventful anymore. McKenna isn’t sleeping as well “on the go” as she used to. I usually can only get about a one hour nap out of her when we are out, but she will make up for it in naps later in the day.
HELPFUL BOOKS/WEBSITES
- On Becoming Baby Wise
- What to Expect the First Year
- The Wonder Weeks.
- Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child
- Secrets of the Baby Whisperer: How to Calm, Connect, and Communicate with Your Baby
- The Baby Whisperer Solves All Your Problems: Sleeping, Feeding, and Behavior–Beyond the Basics from Infancy Through Toddlerhood
- Super Baby Food
- http://kellymom.com/
I love reading these weekly updates; while they may seem boring to you, I have a son (also named Brayden) who is 1 week behind your daughter so I like taking notes from what I might be able to anticipate the coming week! Thanks for keeping up with it all… I Don't know how you do it with 3 kiddos!
I am glad you like them 🙂 As I was writing this, I decided it wasn't so boring after all. But when I started it I thought, "nothing is going on!"
Valerie,Thank you for your Blog! It has been a tremendous help!I am confused about what you do for McKenna's 4th nap. Here you said you put her down at 5:45 to nap, eat at 7, then straight to bed. How does that work? Does she wake naturally at 7, or do you go get her, feed her, and put her back down (like a DF)? Do you turn on lights or leave it dark?My son is 18w today. This past week I've been letting him wake naturally from naps to see what he will do as I was always waking him. I figured he is ready for a 3/3.5 combo schedule. So our schedule was 7/10/1/4/7, bed at 8, DF at 10:30. Following what he will do we are now feeding at 7/10:30/2/5. This is where I am stuck. He won't take a 4th nap after this feed so I've been keeping him up until 7, feeding him before putting him down. Tonight though, I waited until 7 to feed him and he had a meltdown (overtired I think) and I had to put him in the swing to sleep. So I could feed at 6:30-6:45 and then to bed before 7. Can you give me any advice? Should I do like you and not feed him at 6:30 but put him to bed then get him at 8 for his next feed then straight to bed?BTW- I posted something similar to this on the 15w summary, but I think maybe you didn't see it? So please disregard that one! Thanks so much!Kelly
I love reading your blog. It is very helpful. I am really stuck on the night time sleep right now. My boy turned 15 weeks yesterday. He is on a 7,10,1,4,7 schedule and goes to bed around 7:30-7:45. He was doing well and getting up around 3-4 for a feeding and then back down until 6:30 for his morning feed. Then I switched and have been trying the dream feed around 10 but know he is waking at 2;00,3:30, 5-5:30 but I am not feeding him. I am just giving him his pacifier. He is BF at 7, 10, 1, 4 and formula at his 7 and 10 night feed and I pump around 11:00 pm. I am truly at a lost and don't know what to do.Do I go back to no dream feed and feed him around 3-4?? Although I want to try to get rid of that one.Do I keep trying the dream feed but from 2:30 am until 6:30-7 I am not really getting sleep??Thanks so much for your help.Monica
Kelly,For her fourth nap, she usually wakes up after 45-60 minutes of sleeping. If she wakes sooner than is time to eat, I just hold her and have her wait to eat (which she doesn't have a problem with). Then I feed her when it is time. She starts her feeding in the family room where Brayden and Kaitlyn are getting ready for bed. She finishes in her room so it can be calm and quiet.I would try putting him down for a nap around 6:30 or so and expect at most a 30-45 minute nap. He is at an age where most babies drop that nap. McKenna still takes one most days at 19 weeks, though. Then feed him around 7:30 again. Or 8 if he will make it.
Monica,This sounds like exactly what happened to me with Kaitlyn. She was 2 months old and not taking a dreamfeed. I decided to get her to take it so she would drop the night feeding. Well, it didn't work and she started waking up more often in the night. I stopped the dreamfeed, but it took her two weeks to get back to where we were before I messed with it. As she got older and extended her day schedule, her feeding that was at 8 or 8:30 moved back to 10, so she did have a dreamfeed eventually. So you can either keep trying to push it, or go back to life without it. But give it time to see results.
My daughter just finished week 17 and it was a crazy week. I thought maybe she was having a growth spurt and just went with the flow but now I'm getting worried b/c our schedule is SO gone. She was waking up at 5 consistently and so I was trying to get her to get back to 6 or 7 as a waketime and then boom… she started waking up at 4am! I tried adding a dream feed and no matter if/when I dream feed her she wakes at 4ish. Also, at the same time, she has stopped napping well. She used to take two, 21/2-3hr naps in the morning and now she barely makes it 1.5hrs. I've increased her awake time to an hour and then an hour and a half and she still is waking early.. .so I end up feeding her earlier and earlier and she isn't eating great so I'm also worried she's not getting enough… I went from 5 solid, scheduled feedings to 6 or 7 random feedings. Any advice is welcome!
Hmm..is she teething? Is she sick?I suggest you see the posts: naps:troubleshooting revised and updated andnighttime sleep issues: revised and updatedThose should help you figure this out.
I love this blog and refer to it often!! My daughter is 16weeks old and I have noticed that she likes to stay awake for up to 2 hours for her waketime lately! I referred to Babywise and it said that from 16-24 weeks they usually only take 3 naps during the day. So – my question is, why does McKenna still nap so much at this stage and when/how should I adjust my baby's schedule for this?? I'm so confused. :)PS – I've only "loosely" done Babywise with my other 2 kids so this is my first time to actually follow it somewhat right on. Third time and I'm loving it!
Roylances,The grouping of 16-24 weeks means that at some point during this time period, your baby will move to those milestones. It doesn't mean that right at 16 weeks all of the milestones listed will suddenly be present.Most babies go to three naps a day around 4 months old. See the blog label "dropping naps" for several posts outlining the whole process 🙂
Hi Valerie! I've been following your blog soon after my DS was born and have found it very useful!!! I've been doing Babywise without CIO since birth, but two weeks ago realized I wasn't teaching my little one how to self soothe, he was waking several times in the MOTN and I knew it wasn't from hunger. So, we started CIO and to my surprise it went very well. He has truly STTN 3 times already! However, he usually wakes up around 5-5:30, the first few days he only cried for 3-10 minutes and put himself back to sleep until 7:30 (which happens to be my DWT), but the past three days he's cried for 20 minutes and then woke up at 6! I was also wondering about a growth spurt, so today he cried again at 5, after 20 minutes he was still crying so I decided to feed him and reswaddle him (both arms were out, which makes me wonder if this was what woke him up in the first place), but after feeding him he was wide awake! So, how did you manage the EW with McKeena, did you go in as soon as she started crying? How do I know he really needs a feeding? Did you put her right back to bed even if she was wide awake? My schedule is the same as yours and he is also 16 wo. Thank you so much for reading my post!