Every baby is different and therefore read this not as advice but simply my own experience. I was fortunate to end up with two babies who were great sleepers and nappers. I am confident some, or a combination, of these things really helped!

1. Ask your friends what they did! You don’t have to take their advice but chances are good, amongst everyone’s there will be one or some ideas of value you can use.
2. Create a consistent sleeping routine so the baby learns the ‘sleep’ signals
3. Learn your baby’s signals (some might be crying, twitching, ear pulling, eye rubbing, not eating) which mean they are tired and need some sleep.
4. Are they warm enough? In winter, it’s a fine line between overheating babies and them not being warm enough and I was under-dressing my little girl. It was my friend Rachael who realized poor Grace was so cold (and therefore not sleeping more than an hour or so) in our cold, cold house. She told me some advice she had been given which is they should be wearing one more layer than you are before they are wrapped.
5. Is the baby hungry? In these first few months their hunger can be really surprising!
6. For some babies, the expression “the more they sleep then the more they will sleep” is true. It certainly was for both of mine. If they took good long naps during the day then they slept even better at night. I knew the days they napped badly meant an unsettled night. It’s counterintuitive I know but it was accurate for mine.
7. If you have good weather to go outside comfortably, I found some time outside, ie. fresh oxygen, really helped my babies sleep – even as little as half an hour.
8. Finally, my girlfriend Annabelle gave me a great piece of advice which helped me through those realllly loooong days. Expect one ‘difficult’ part of the day and one ‘difficult’ day of the week on average.