What is an awake window?

If you are a new parent you will likely start to hear common phrases around infant sleep - sleep regression - sleep association and awake window - but what does it mean?

Baby yawning - ready for a nap?

An awake window is a period of time that your baby can stay awake between naps and bedtime - in a nutshell, its the ample amount of time that they can stay awake without being overtired.

Awake windows are however, generic guidelines and that is how you should use them. Some babies (mainly thumbsuckers) will be on the shorter end of the awake window and will hold onto naps for longer than average. Other babies will be on the high end, and drop naps earlier than average, so if you are using an awake window chart, use it as a guide ONLY for your baby, it is not set in stone.

As time goes on, babies start to lengthen the amount of time that they can stay awake between sleeps, so on average a 4 month old will average around 2 hrs of awake time between sleeps, where as a 2 year old is up to 6 hrs of awake time between sleeps. As they grow the amount of sleep that an infant will need to sleep for, will also decrease.

Awake windows can be helpful as they can help you carve out a flow to your day or routine, I’m not a big fan of using the word ‘schedule’ for a small baby, as we have remember that they are babies and not computers, its much easier for an older child to have a schedule, so use the guide to help you get a flow going.

In my awake window chart - which is also a fridge magnet, shows not only the window but also the suggested length of each nap as time goes on.

An awake window chart

These are fridge magnet so that you can keep all the information one one handy place click to get a Freebie!!

Another way to help your gauge your babies awake window is by paying attention to the time you put them in their place of sleep compared to the time that they have actually fallen to sleep.

The ideal goal is that they are asleep within 20 minutes of going to bed awake without any props - if you are still using props, then this could be slightly skewed.

Tired signs in babies can often be missed - so using the window is just a helpful guide when paired with behaviours from your baby. Other signs that your baby is ready for a nap or down to bed for the night, can include but not be limited too:

Staring off into space - when babies are getting tired, they will get a glazed look in their eyes and start to stare off into space.

Disengaging from you - this pairs with the starting off into space above, when a baby is getting tired, they will start to disengage from any play or interaction with you, they may even start to act fussy when you try to interact with them.

Yawning - this can be a little bit more difficult as babies also yawn to gain oxygen, or because they are bored, but its also a tired cue.

Pulling their ears - combined with some of the above babies will also grasp at their ears, or hair and become more jerky in their movements, this can also cause them to become more upset, as they cant make the connection that its them pulling on themselves.

Rubbing their eyes - this can also cause some red marks around their brow.

Crying - when a baby is past their ideal awake window they will often cry to help themselves cope, they close their eyes, clench their fists and cry to help themselves unwind and blow off steam, they do not have the same outlets as us so this often causes stress in parents, but once they cried they will return to a more calm state or even fall to sleep.

There is always a lot of worry in parents, about babies being overtired and overstimulated and this greatly impacting their ability to fall to sleep and this is correct.

Just like us babies need to unwind before they go to bed, and also need to be going down in a good window but overtired behaviour and overstimulated behaviour looks the same as does being under-tired which can also happen.  When your baby is any of these, expect to see them fight sleep more and be up more in the first few hours of sleep.

Once your baby is napping - you want to keep it that way!

If like me, you order on amazon you might be worried about your baby waking up with the door bell ding donging. Well I have a freebie for that too!

I also have door hangers too!

Grab your freebies by clicking the image or clicking on the links.