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Hi Nappers,
Quick question: if you’re aiming for a 7–7 schedule and your baby wakes at 6:15am, what time do you start the day?
From the moment they open their eyes? From when you hear them on the monitor? Or from when you actually go in, turn the lights on, and start the morning?
If you picked option one or two, you might be unknowingly pulling your whole schedule earlier. And that tiny shift, repeated over days, is often why early mornings keep creeping earlier, and naps start feeling harder than they should.
This week Sally and Bec tackle one of the most common (and sanity-saving) distinctions in scheduling: awake time vs UP time. They sound like the same thing. They’re not.
Awake time is simply when your baby wakes. UP time is when you start the day, and on a 7–7 schedule, that’s the anchor that protects your body clock and stops the early rising spiral. Your baby can wake at 6:20am and still be “on” a 7am schedule, because 7am is go time, lights, milk, noise, and the day officially begins.
Then we get practical with naps. You can keep the first nap anchored to the clock to protect the structure of the day, but when a nap ends early, wake windows matter. You count the next wake window from when your baby actually woke, not the time you hoped they’d sleep until. Otherwise you can stack too much awake time, tip into overtired territory, and suddenly bedtime is chaos.
You’ll learn:
How to use UP time to keep a 7–7 schedule steady, even with early wakes
Why nap one often stays anchored to the clock
When to switch to wake windows based on the time your baby actually wakes
How to handle early nap wake ups without wrecking the rest of the day
The simple flexibility rule that keeps schedules working in real life
Listen on Spotify or Apple Podcasts HERE
Or, watch below:
Bec walks through a real scenario: baby wakes at 3pm, you start the bedtime routine at 6:30pm, but baby doesn't actually fall asleep until 7:15pm. So what's the wake window for the next morning? Most parents get this wrong.
Sally explains why counting from "up time" (out of the crib) instead of "awake time" (eyes open) gives you way more accurate scheduling. And why trying to be too precise with wake windows can actually create more problems than it solves.
They also answer the question every parent asks: what if my baby takes 30 minutes to fall asleep every single time? Do I need to add that to the wake window?
Spoiler: yes. But not the way you think.
With you in the trenches, Sally + Bec 💤
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