BabyWise 11-12 Months

11-12 Months

I've been following BabyWise pretty consistently from day one and it always gives the schedules or merges in weeks (Schedule for 24-39 weeks or merge five) and it always confused me, I had to try to calculate how old my kid would be and when I had to start looking for transitional phases. I wrote this blog by monthly transitions so I could better remember for my next kid. ALSO, to remember that each kid is different, just like my first went to a 4 hour schedule at 5 and 1/2 half months, my next one may be 6 and 1/2 months, who knows? Well actually, you'll know, you'll understand whats best. here is the feeding schedule I used.

11 Months (week 1)
(3 feedings)
7:00 AM- Wake, Nurse Feed, Play
8:45 AM-Solid Feed
9:00 AM- Nap
11:00 AM- Wake, Nurse Feed, Play
12:45 PM- Solid Feed
1:00-2:00 PM- Nap
3:30-4:30 PM- Wake, Nurse Feed, Play
6:00-6:30 PM- Solids, Play
*8:00 PM- Down for the night.

*I only stopped his night time feeding because in the BabyWise book I read there were no more liquid feedings at night between 46-52 weeks. I wanted to start weaning him to three feedings because I read it was beneficial to start getting them used to three feeding, or the feedings that your family would be eating.

11 Months (week 2)
(2 feedings)
7:00 AM- Wake, Nurse Feed, Play
8:45 AM-Solid Feed
9:00 AM- Nap
11:00 AM- Wake, *Milk Bottle, Play
12:45 PM- Solid Feed
1:00-2:00 PM- Nap
3:30-4:30 PM- Wake, Nurse Feed, Play
6:00-6:30 PM- Solids, Play
8:00 PM- Down for the night.

*I know this may be controversial because your pediatrician will say to not introduce milk until they are at least a year old. I started a little early, my son was weighing well, and didn't want less nursing to effect him too much. I also had family members that would introduce milk at 11.5 months and things went well. He didn't really take to the milk right away, and we had to find a bottle that he liked, he loved drinking out of straws so we found a bottle that had a straw for him to sip the milk out of.

11 Months (week 3)
(1 feedings)
7:00 AM- Wake, Nurse Feed, Play
8:45 AM-Solid Feed
*10:00 AM- Nap
12:00 AM- Wake, Lunch with Milk Bottle, Play, Snack
*3:00 PM- Nap
5:00 PM- Wake, Dinner with Milk Bottle, Play
8:00 PM- Down for the night.

*At this point I changed the napping schedule. It was more of a 5 hour schedule: up for 3 hours, nap for 2 hours, this also allowed the continued wake, feed, sleep routine. He would wake up at noon, ready to eat, and than again at five ready to eat. This helped to put him on the same schedule as the family too. We eat at noon, so he would eat with us. The 5:00 o'clock dinner wasn't always consistent with the family, if I knew I wasn't going to have dinner done for a while I would make sure he would get a snack, until we had dinner.

11 Months (week 4)
(0 feedings)
7:00 AM- Wake, Breakfast with Milk Bottle, Play, Snack
10:00 AM- Nap
12:00 AM- Wake, Lunch with Milk Bottle, Play, Snack
3:00 PM- Nap
5:00 PM- Wake, Dinner with Milk Bottle, Play, Snack
8:00 PM- Down for the night.

By this time my son was completely weaned AND there was little discomfort as I stopped nursing and my milk dried up. I would usually provide a snack before nap time and here and there when I felt he needed it. He was still sleeping majority of the two hour frame I gave him for naps, but would go through phases where he didn't sleep well, which happens, but I learned they were phases.

12 Months
7:00 AM- Wake, Breakfast with Milk Bottle, Play, Snack
10:00 AM- Nap
12:00 AM- Wake, Lunch with Milk Bottle, Play, Snack
3:00 PM- Nap
5:00 PM- Wake, Dinner with Milk Bottle, Play, Snack
*8:00 PM- Offer Milk Bottle, Down for the night.

At our one year check up with the pediatrician, we talked about milk and how much my son was getting. He wasn't entirely hooked on milk yet and I wasn't being adamant about offering it. The doctor informed me it should be around 16-24 oz a day, which is about 2-3 bottles, but he said to watch out for constipation, which will come from too much milk. My son was no where near drinking that much milk, so I started offering him milk at night as we read a story before bed. It seemed to help. We got pretty consistent at drinking an entire bottle between breakfast and lunch meals and then another bottle at dinner and before bed, but there were those rare days that he would drink an entire bottle just at breakfast, on these occasions I would offer water at lunch and then continue with milk at dinner.

I can't repeat often enough that every kid will be different and every household schedule will be different. I liked that we switched to a 5 hour schedule, and am hopeful to keep him at two naps a day for as long as possible.