Getting in a routine

So it's been awhile since I posted anything.  This is due to the fact that I never have my hands free anymore and I can't seem to get the baby on a nap schedule.  Ideally I would like to get up at 8:00 a.m. after Mike leaves for work and then play with him until 10:00 at which point I would put him down for a nap and I would either nap myself or do other things around the house that need to get done.  Then ideally he'd wake up somewhere around noon and we'd go for a walk and play some more until about 2:00 when he'd go down for another nap, at which point (once my doctor clears me to exercise) I would do more exercise down in our basement with the elliptical machine and weights.

However, this plan is not working out because I haven't been managing to get myself up at 8:00 and because he won't sleep unless he's in my arms.  He slept for 8 hours last night (non consecutive, but 8 hours nonetheless) and only woke me up once for about 40 minutes.  Pretty spectacular.  So I managed to make myself get up at 7:30 while Mike was still getting ready to leave.  I let bitty boy sleep longer while I went downstairs to get my breakfast and planned to get him up at 8:00.  It is now 8:17.  I should go get him up, but I just hate to wake him when he's sleeping so well in his bassinet and I don't have to hold him while he sleeps.

Yesterday I was trying to put him down for a nap around 2:00 and he didn't go to sleep and stay asleep until about 3:30 when I gave up trying to put him in his crib and just held him on my lap and let him sleep there.  I swear, it was like I was pressing a "cry" button every time I would move him away from my body.  And it didn't matter how asleep he was because I let him sleep on my lap for like an half an hour and then tried to put him down and he still immediately woke up and started crying.

I don't really get it.  He has slept in the crib before.  And he sleeps in the bassinet every night by himself.  The only thing I can figure is that he's not swaddled tight enough in the crib and me holding him has the same effect as the swaddler we use at night.  It is the one the hospital gave us and it swaddles him really tightly and keeps his hands from coming out near his waist.  But it's wool and during the day it gets hotter in the house and I don't like putting him in the wool swaddler because I'm afraid he'll get too hot.  So we bought some cotton swaddlers but they're made differently than the wool one the hospital gave us and I don't think they swaddle him as tightly.  Either that or the way they swaddle him isn't as good.  They allow his hands to get free at his waist.  He never gets his arms totally free, but his hands get out and I think maybe that wakes him up.

Anyway, today I was planning on trying to enforce my routine plan with the 10:00 a.m. and 2:00 p.m. nap schedule, but put him in his wool swaddler in the bassinet in my bedroom, so it's like when he goes to bed at night.  Maybe eventually once he gets used to sleeping at these times I can transition him to his crib so I can leave the baby monitor in there.  I guess I'll just have to use the wool swaddler and turn the ceiling fan up high until it gets cooler outside.  Fortunately, the master bedroom tends to be the coldest in the house so I don't think he gets too warm in there.  I'm more worried about him in his nursery.  Anyway, we'll see how well my plan works.  So far nothing I've planned with him has really worked out, so I don't have high hopes.  But it's almost 8:30 now and he's fussing so I'd better get him up if I even want to try.  Here goes nothing....