Help With Mornings

[twinmomma]

Guys, I'm losing my damn mind over our morning routines. Help me make this go more smoothly. 

I'm up at 5:15 to get myself totally ready before anyone else. 
DH is up around 6/6:15.
Kids are up between 6:15 and 6:30.
I have to be out the door by 7. Now that the semester changed, DH also has to be out the door at roughly the same time. 

In theory, 45 minutes should be more than enough time for my children to eat breakfast and get dressed. But I swear I spend my entire morning yelling at them to do the shit I need them to do. Eat your breakfast, drink your milk, get dressed, put on your glasses, put on your shoes, etc... I have to ask multiple times and often physically move a child to the correct place before it is actually done. 

I'm basically ready to lose my shit by the time I run out the door. I hate that we're starting the morning off in such a negative way, but I don't know what to do. 

We have a picture chart on the fridge with all the things that need to be done. No one cares. Might as well not exist. 

Help me. I can't take it anymore!

[divanerd]

Hugs momma. .I feel ya pain. I started a rewards chart but my son is only 5.

Now if it's the weekend, he has no problem being up

[sweetptater]

*sits down and waits for the magic solution*

[yummmy]

I was totally in the same boat as you until I threw up my hands this weekend and said we had to do something, I was starting every morning by yelling or crying and so was DS and we were getting to work/school so late every day. DS is super competitive and likes to win and he likes to play games, so I turned our morning routine into a game. He is also all into space so I made it a moon game. He has to move his astronaut around the moon stopping at and completing each step prior to the timer going off. If he makes it to his rocket then he gets a mini donut in the car on the way to school. If he doesn't make it then his astronaut is stranded on the moon and the TV remote doesn't work with a stranded astronaut (so he lost all TV for the evening). It's worked great for us. Now when he is dilly dallying or not doing what he is supposed to do instead of moving him, yelling at him, or reminding him again I just say "what is your astronaut doing?" or "don't strand your astronaut" and it turns his attitude right around. Yesterday he had only 38 seconds left on his timer. Today he had 7 minutes and 57 seconds left! 

[sweetptater]

Jan 30, 2018 8:43:35 GMT -5 yummmy said:

I was totally in the same boat as you until I threw up my hands this weekend and said we had to do something, I was starting every morning by yelling or crying and so was DS and we were getting to work/school so late every day. DS is super competitive and likes to win and he likes to play games, so I turned our morning routine into a game. He is also all into space so I made it a moon game. He has to move his astronaut around the moon stopping at and completing each step prior to the timer going off. If he makes it to his rocket then he gets a mini donut in the car on the way to school. If he doesn't make it then his astronaut is stranded on the moon and the TV remote doesn't work with a stranded astronaut (so he lost all TV for the evening). It's worked great for us. Now when he is dilly dallying or not doing what he is supposed to do instead of moving him, yelling at him, or reminding him again I just say "what is your astronaut doing?" or "don't strand your astronaut" and it turns his attitude right around. Yesterday he had only 38 seconds left on his timer. Today he had 7 minutes and 57 seconds left! 

This is seriously brilliant. I wish I had half of your creativity! 

[kimberlybb]

To save some time in the mornings can the girls eat breakfast in the car or on the bus to school? We don't have time for the kids to eat at home so they have dry cereal, muffins, or a granola bar on the way to daycare. Maybe they could earn extra screen time or another privilege if they get ready within a certain amount of time. Trying to get out the door in the mornings is the worst so I feel your pain!

[twinmomma]

yummmy, That's genius! What do you use for a timer? Sometimes we'll use the Echo to set timers, but I don't think they really "get it" because there's no visual cue that the timer is running out. They have zero concept of how much time is left and then they waste all their time constantly asking Alexa how much time is left. It totally back fires.

[2chatter]

I accidentally discovered that if my kids feel like they have time, they lounge. Here if they want a ride we have to leave by 7:09 because I can’t turn left to the house after 7:15. We used to leave at 7:20 to walk. Taking away 15 minutes worked - they don’t want to walk alone when it’s 15 (because hell no im not walking and they know it). So I can say “eat breakfast, 7 minutes” and they will sit down and eat breakfast. Could you compress the clock to get them
Moving?

[twinmomma]

kimberlybb, The ride to school is like, 3 minutes long. So no time to eat breakfast. And I honestly don't want to encourage eating breakfast outside the house. They're obsessed with "hot lunch" and know that buying breakfast is an option. We've told them that buying breakfast at school is not an option because we have time in the morning and I don't want to open that can of worms.

[justcheckingin73]

That’s amazing yummmy! I completely agree with making it a game. I had to do this a lot with DS when he was younger. He wouldn’t dilly dally, he would flat out refuse so I had to do something. We used to race a lot but yummmy’s suggestion sounds perfect since there are so many different things they have to do to get out the door. Plus, at this point your kids are probably used to your yelling/getting frustrated and it doesn’t work for them and just makes you frazzled (and P.S. I’m not judging at all - I’ve been here so many times )

[yummmy]

Jan 30, 2018 8:48:03 GMT -5 twinmomma said:

yummmy, That's genius! What do you use for a timer? Sometimes we'll use the Echo to set timers, but I don't think they really "get it" because there's no visual cue that the timer is running out. They have zero concept of how much time is left and then they waste all their time constantly asking Alexa how much time is left. It totally back fires.

We used a simple kitchen timer from Walmart. That way he sees the numbers going down.

[erinshelley21]

Can you start by waking them up when your H gets up? An extra 15 minutes might help.

[campermom]

How old are they? My 6 and 8 year old get up btwn 6 and 6:15 and we also leave by 7. They have to get dressed, brush teeth and wash faces before they come downstairs. H or I have lunches packed and stacked in the fridge the night before. When they get down the first thing they do is "pack their lunch" which really means I set their lunch stuff out and they put it in their lunch boxes with a cooler pack. 1) one less thing for me and 2) they do better with goal directed routines. Otherwise my oldest will read the paper (lol) or his book while he eats cereal and that added 30 mins and a lot of stress. In fact he was the one to ask to be woken up at 6 instead of 6:15 to have more time bc he loves cereal.

No tv, at all. No ipads. There's no time.

My daughter (6) is the most amazing when it comes to her morning routine. She literally pops out of bed and gets herself ready. My older son is more of a normal kid. He lollygags, requires repeats etc.

Sometimes they eat at home sometimes I have already packed breakfast for daycare. I get my 2 year old up at the last possible moment, dress him, brush his teeth and put him in the car. He always eats at daycare.

All of the obvious "pack everything the light before" tips, but this also goes for picking out my daughter's outfits on Sundays.

I have to get up earlier than that to get myself ready, usually.
Also my H is not home.
If he is, he slows up the well oiled machine!

ETA we also rate ourselves. When we get in the van we decide how we did on a scale of 1-10. Sometimes we will work for something the next day if it was a rough day.

[HeartofCheese]

Jan 30, 2018 8:53:54 GMT -5 yummmy said:

Jan 30, 2018 8:48:03 GMT -5 twinmomma said:

yummmy , That's genius! What do you use for a timer? Sometimes we'll use the Echo to set timers, but I don't think they really "get it" because there's no visual cue that the timer is running out. They have zero concept of how much time is left and then they waste all their time constantly asking Alexa how much time is left. It totally back fires.

We used a simple kitchen timer from Walmart. That way he sees the numbers going down.

Holy jesus, you're brilliant. At the same time, my heart sinks to think that this is what it's going to take to get the kids out the door...

[twinmomma]

campermom, They're 5. We already don't do TV, tablets, etc.. It's strictly getting ready for school time, which is why I think 45 minutes should be plenty!

I like the idea of them getting dressed before they come downstairs, but I honestly don't think it would make them move faster. Plus, they usually eat something with peanut butter for breakfast and I worry about it being on their clothes for school.

I'm thinking I can modify the charts I created to be some kind of game. Or do a pom pom jar or something if they can check everything off in a timely manner with no yelling. I think there needs to be some kind of motivation/reward for it. Right now, there's no reason for them to do what needs to be done, at least in their minds.

[yummmy]

HeartofCheese - Thanks! Yea I had to do something. My kid is stubborn and independent. (gets it straight from me... haha) And the more I yelled in the morning the more he yelled and dug his feet in, it was bad! It was ruining our mornings and rolling into ruining our nights. This has been a life saver. Giving him the independence and the ability to win or not. And it's working on time and numbers with him since he's only 3.5.

[sweetptater]

Jan 30, 2018 9:07:10 GMT -5 twinmomma said:

campermom , They're 5. We already don't do TV, tablets, etc.. It's strictly getting ready for school time, which is why I think 45 minutes should be plenty!

I like the idea of them getting dressed before they come downstairs, but I honestly don't think it would make them move faster. Plus, they usually eat something with peanut butter for breakfast and I worry about it being on their clothes for school.

I'm thinking I can modify the charts I created to be some kind of game. Or do a pom pom jar or something if they can check everything off in a timely manner with no yelling. I think there needs to be some kind of motivation/reward for it. Right now, there's no reason for them to do what needs to be done, at least in their minds.

I like this idea...I'm thinking I could put a pom pom at each of their stations (where they get dressed, brush teeth, hair, breakfast, shoes) and each time they complete the task they could put that pom pom into their jar. If they don't have them all in their jar when it's time to leave, or I have to tell them to do the activity, they can't put it in. Maybe they get to a certain number and get a small reward? Hmmm......the wheels in my mind are spinning now. 

[mommyatty]

We have two adults and two kids. When I’m not traveling, each adult is in charge of one kid. When I’m gone, it takes DH longer and DD (our morning glory child) helps out more.

[itsme]

I am solo in the mornings and was losing it until a friend suggested giving my kid a breakfast shake. Genius idea! I buy Nestle Breakfast Essentials and my kid loves it. Now, the getting dressed thing is something different. I have to get her up and do that for her while she is practically still sleeping. I feel bad that we have to get up so early.

[phdmomma]

Our biggest thing is making sure that the kids are dressed before they come downstairs for breakfast. If they take too long getting dressed then there is less time for breakfast. DS (6) is actually pretty easy in that regard, as I put out some clothes or he grabs some clothes and just puts them on. DD (3) on the other hand, takes quite a bit longer as she has very definite opinions on clothing. Like today she is wearing a college jersey, leggings, and her faux fur shawl that came with the christmas dress that she refused to wear. We get up at 6:00 AM and the bus comes at 7:15AM for DS for school. DD likes to go wait at the bus stop, and then she and I take the stroller to daycare, which is a few blocks from my office. The phrase I use for breakfast is "Eat if you want it, because we have to go", they don't have to eat, but know that they will be hungry if they don't.

[xctsclrx]

My parents solved this by order of priority. Get up, use bathroom, get dressed, eat breakfast, brush teeth and then out the door. If I missed brushing teeth or eating breakfast, because I took too long oh well. I think my mom enforced the breakfast thing once and it wasn't an issue again. Although I might have been a little older maybe 2nd grade when she finally had enough.

[akafred]

No idle time! Idle time is the devil! DH is sick so I got DD out the door on 45 min this morning and that included cooking sausage and eggs, feeding the dog, etc. She was motivated to "help daddy", but I set timers. When they went off, breakfast was done. Being hungry will not kill her plus they have snack at school. When the timer went off again, time to stop playing with the dog and go. Only sticky wicket was shoes and she came down in shorts so she had to make 2 extra trips upstairs to get her shoes and to get some long pants to at least put in her backpack.

[erinshelley21]

campermom, my mornings take longer when DH is home too. FFTC: on the days in between his work days, I try to get out the door before he gets home. I don't feel bad because he could easily go pick them up if he really wanted too.

[sweetptater]

Question for those who's kids get dressed before breakfast - how do you keep them from getting food all over their clothes? My kids aren't slobs, but they drip milk or syrup on themselves quite a bit.

I used to have them dress before they came downstairs, which was awesome and saved so much time, but I realized I was changing shirts/pants multiple times each week which just added the time back in. What's the secret?

[186momx]

campermom, erinshelley21, Add me to the list of mornings go worse when DH is home. It has gotten to the point if he is off and we still have work/school/care he stays in bed and pretends he isn't home.

twinmomma, I can see not wanting to pay for school breakfast but can't you send them packed breakfast to school to eat? DD (6) has free breakfast at school but likes to take something from home to either eat at before care or eat as the school hot breakfast is yucky. My DD is a slow eater so eating at home isn't an option at all.

DD only gets 15-20 minutes in the morning. She isn't a morning person so I let her sleep as long as possible. I wake her at 7, she pees & brushes teeth, gets dressed, I put her hair up while she gets her shoes on, and then it is time to go. I'm also not a morning person so I get up at 6:50ish do my bathroom stuff, dressed, crock pot dinner if needed, load up lunches/breakfasts, help DD and out the door. I also eat breakfast once I get to work as I need to be up a good hour before I can even think about eating anything. We have no idle time and the only thing I usually say is "lets go, lets go" if I find her curled up on the couch trying to snooze. I've found the more time we both have the more dinking around we do (off season Friday mornings) and the more I get frustrated and start harping.

[waverly]

sweetptater, DS doesn't have syrup. He does spill milk on himself sometimes and he still goes in that shirt unless it is a bad spill. You could have them drink water unless you want them to have milk.

Otherwise for DD, I pour her syrup so it is less syrup to cut down on the mess. Again if she gets a few spots of syrup on her- oh well she still goes to school with a couple of spots of syrup on her.

We've been doing a lot of muffins in the morning lately. DD only really has syrup maybe 1-2 times per week.

[mustardseed2007]

On the issue of clothes before breakast - we do this and I don't find that they normally get too messy. I have a 3 and 6 year old. They get crummy and we have to clean face and hands before we go, but it's not really an issue of destroying their clothes most of the time.

I am kind of thinking you actually need to give the kids more like an hour, but we don't get out the door as early as you so maybe that's not really an option and I'm off here.

[2chatter]

186momx - we do the reverse here - I sleep in when DH is here! He deals with his chaos. The kids won’t leave him alone but they will leave me alone. It’s kind of awesome except I can hear the crying. (Rarely is there crying if it’s just me and the kids)

I had DD eat shirtless until around 8 because she’s a train wreck. It’s a bad idea. She is an undies only nudist at 10 and it’s hard to keep her in clothes and she’s too old for that.

10 was the magic age where she stopped getting her sleeves grubby, stopped covering her front in food. It felt like forever to get here, esp as DS has never made a mess while eating.

[186momx]

I asked DH to go in later yesterday to help us out as I needed to get DD to before care earlier as I had an early doctor appointment. DH left at 7 after getting DD up at 6:47. All she did was whine about daddy's cold hands and he woke her up 13 minutes too early. After he left DD went thank goodness daddy is gone and it is just us girls. We only made it out of the house 5 minutes earlier with his help and she did 90% of her morning stuff after he left at 7. I was up 40 minutes earlier than normal and I didn't even do crock pot dinner last night. Other than waking us up super early all DH did was stand around looking lost and getting in the way. Lesson learned

I have a neat freak so no help there. Could you put an oversized shirt over their clothes for protection?

[mommyatty]

Jan 30, 2018 12:17:08 GMT -5 sweetptater said:

Question for those who's kids get dressed before breakfast - how do you keep them from getting food all over their clothes? My kids aren't slobs, but they drip milk or syrup on themselves quite a bit.

I used to have them dress before they came downstairs, which was awesome and saved so much time, but I realized I was changing shirts/pants multiple times each week which just added the time back in. What's the secret?

We limit their options on school days. No syrup. They get peanut butter toast or a breakfast bar and fruit. DD is more likely to get stuff on her, so DH tucks a napkin over her. They eat breakfast in front of the tv (which is motivation for them to get dressed fast so they have tv time), and DD tends to lean over into her plate if she’s not being careful. That’s mainly what the napkin prevents. Also, DH only lets them have sippy cups before school to cut down on milk spills. I think 5 year old DD is going to rebel against sippy cups soon.