To nap or not to nap?

Nicole is at that age where naps are becoming more irregular.  It seems too soon, but here are the details:

  • On days she naps, it takes her hours to fall asleep at night when she doesn’t nap, she falls to sleep quickly and easily
  • She often gets very grumpy for the last hour or two before bedtime with no nap, but sometimes she’s just fine.
  • If she falls asleep in the car, but wakes before I lay her in her bed she will not nap, even if she was exhausted and only slept for 5 min.
  • It is very difficult to get her to fall asleep during the ideal naptime.  I’ve even resorted to trying a movie nap, but it hasn’t worked.
  • She will fall asleep for a nap if I put her in her bed with a movie on around 4 which means she wakes up shortly before bedtime and that doesn’t work well.

This picture is from today when she fell asleep on the floor in her room, watching a movie at 4:00.  She woke up as the other kids were going to bed. 7.2.10 Nicole's napWhat would you do?