This is the second post in my Mommy Mondays, I know it’s not Monday but it is the start of the work week! Read my first one here. 

Well, that was the fastest summer that’s flown by. I know it’s not officially over, but LDW is pretty much it for us in New England with the warm weather.

All summer long, we’ve been traveling with Tommy between Cape Cod and Maine. At the start, Tommy was pretty good about going to bed right at 7pm. However, he never had regularly scheduled naps. They also very rarely (maybe once) happened in his crib.

I felt like this was a true mark of failure as a new mom back in June. In hindsight, I feel like Tommy’s ability to fall asleep on the go verses in a quiet bedroom actually helped us enjoy summer more than we expected.

How We Managed To Enjoy Long Beach Days

Living in the city, space is a commodity especially when it comes to the trunk of your car! Our umbrella stroller became a staple for our summer trips taking up less space in the back than our regular city stroller. The UPPAbaby G-LUXE is compact, light weight and has an expandable SPF 50+ shade. Not only was it easy to bring on road trips but it also doubled as a place for Tommy to nap away from home.

From personal experience, daily naps usually dictate beach days for parents. Some kids nap on the beach and but most need to be in their beds. I have had friends and family leave the beach to go home right in the middle of the day so their kids could nap. This was what I too expected.

I didn’t know what kind of baby Tommy would be but we got lucky and Tommy was happy to fall asleep in his stroller or on someone’s chest.

We thought this was amazing. We would spend 7 hours at the beach relaxing, hanging out with our friends and playing with T in the water. It was like our summer days hardly changed except for the fact that we had to keep an eye on a miniature person.

Where napping on the go has its benefits, it also has its downfalls…

We never really knew how long a nap would be. Sometimes, Tommy would fall asleep on Nick’s chest for 90 minutes in 85 degree temperatures. Thank god for the sport-brella to keep them cool.

And if we weren’t on the beach, nap time was always in the stroller. Visiting Nick’s family in Maine, I would have to go for walks so that Tommy would nap each morning.

Since he started crawling, I’ve been working in the mornings and rely on nap time to get stuff done. When your child will only sleep in a stroller or car seat, it’s challenging to do much of anything that can’t be done on a phone.

Despite this much frustrating product of napping on the go, I don’t think I would trade my summer for predictability or productivity.

I try not to compare my parenting skills but what I once thought was a failure at the start of summer turned out not being such a bad thing (at least when I wasn’t stressed out about working). I do plan to try to sleep training Tommy to nap in his crib come now that we are in Boston for an extended period of time.

I don’t know what will happen next year when Tommy is 18 months at the beach. I’d like to think that we will have a schedule but that he will also be able to nap at the beach. Our fingers are crossed.

This is a sponsored conversation written by me on behalf of UPPAbaby. The opinions and text are all mine.