Poor Seth is too tired to use a question mark. As part of our Q&A series, he wants to know my thoughts on:

Napping. Or lack thereof.

Seth, I feel your pain. While Harper is generally faithful napper, he was not a consistently good night sleeper until recently. (By "consistently good," I mean he's slept through the night for the last week or so, and if answering your question has caused me to jinx that lucky streak, then I will hunt you down).

BabyCenter has some helpful articles that round up the opinions of the major voices in baby care when it comes to naps. They all say that toddlers between one and two years of age will drop their morning nap and take one possibly longer nap in the afternoon. Here, again, what the "experts" have to say on the matter runs counter to my experience.

Here's how our schedule used to play out: Harper would wake up between 6 and 7, have a morning nap between 9 and 11 or so, have an afternoon nap between 3 and 4:30, and then go to bed around 7:30. He began refusing his afternoon nap weeks ago in favor of an earlier bedtime. Now he naps around 10, and he's been known to be out for up three hours. Then he's awake and active for the rest of the day, though I will sometimes put him in his crib with a few books for 20 minutes of "quiet time" in the afternoon if Mama needs it. After dinner, bath, books, and milk, he's ready for bed around 6:30, and he's been falling asleep with much less sturm und drang.

While I praise the advent of the full-night's sleep, these new developments have also complicated our daily routine. Whereas midday used to be our best time to go out, now everything is shifting and I am forced to either wake him up before he's ready so we can get out for our usual activities or sit at home and wait it out. Many days, I don't get out of the house for anything substantial before noon, and as a result feel like a bit of a slacker. And therein lies the rub of the whole napping issue: We want our kids to be well rested and cheerful but boy does it suck to be holed up in your house while they sleep away. Also, boy does it suck when your kid refuses to nap and you want to get out to do something but you risk the inevitable exhaustion meltdown. And have I mentioned how much it sucks when you have an appointment or a deadline or you've planned something really important or fun around a naptime that's been consistent for months, and then, whammo, no nap?

When I asked Harper's pediatrician about this very issue, her (not very comforting) advice was, "There are three things you can't make a kid do: eat, sleep, or go to the bathroom." She suggested all I could do was "give him an opportunity to nap." We have occasional days when Harper doesn't seize this "opportunity," and for those days I try to keep a mental arsenal of mutually beneficial things that we can get out and do for an hour or so with minimal planning, such as a long, brisk walk (fresh air for him, excercise for me), a trip to the park (playtime for him, moms to commiserate with for me), or a quick grocery trip to Trader Joes (complimentary balloon for him, something to scratch off the to-do list for me). Then we come home and try the nap thing all over again, and repeat as necessary.

I guess that's all we can do as parents. Roll with it. Try, try again. Know when to hold 'em and know when to fold 'em. And when all else fails, keep a well appointed liquor cabinet.