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My daughter (6 months is on a nap schedule and has been since she was about 2-3 months or so.  She wakes around 6:30-7:00am and naps around 9, 11, 1, and 3 (give or take 15-30 minutes).  She takes all her naps in her bouncy chair (she goes into the chair with her blanket and dolphin-white noise).  I bounce her a few minutes to get her to fall asleep then stop. 

How do I get her to take naps in her crib?  My thought was to rock her then put her in her crib drowsy and pat her to sleep.  I don't think this is going to be very successful.  Unless she's really tired it's hard to get her to nap in her crib.  I was so concerned with her receiving adequate sleep I just went with the bouncy chair and got her on a schedule.  Now that she is on a schedule, how do I get her in her crib?

Kim

Okay, this sounds good.  I think a gradual approach would be the best.  I'm thinking I could pick one nap time per day and stick with it every day for a week.  I'm so nervous about this.  We have really good days right now and I'm afraid to make our days miserable by changing her naps.  I'm sure I've created a sleep association. 

My sister in law has always put her kids down for naps in the swing until they turn 1 and then started putting them in their cribs.  I was following this advice (she has 6 kids).  Is it best to start now at 6 months rather than later when she is napping 2 times per day rather than 4 naps a day?  I guess it seems like all I do is put her down for naps.

Right now we are transitioning her into her crib at night so she is in her crib about 1/4 of the time and co-sleeping 3/4 of the time.  Baby steps….

Thanks for your advice.  I'm printing it out and will share it with my husband.

So we tried with one nap today.  I rocked her and put her down and pat her.  It took 45 minutes and it didn't work.  She was overtired at that point and had a melt down.  I then put her in the bouncy chair and it took 15 minutes of bouncing to put her to sleep (I stop after she's out)…usually this takes 5 minutes.  So after one hour of this I decided not to try again for the rest of the day because that would be absolutely all we would do.  She still naps basically every 2 hours.