Apr

My ½ hour morning routine for getting the kids ready in 7 easy steps

It’s important to give credit where it’s do and without my mothers’ advice I would be a mess. She created my morning routine and we execute it. This is how we cut our morning routine from a 1½ to a ½ hour.

1. Get yourself ready first

When I first became a single parent one of my many mistakes in the morning was getting the kids ready first and then me. They would be knocking on the shower door, playing with my razor (that only happened once and no one got hurt), started to play with their toys (that’s a big no-no in our house) and it’s a morning routine killer. I was a disaster. Now, I wake up early and get myself out of the way first.

2. Getting the kids up and ready to eat – 5 minutes

In the beginning I had to go into their room and wake them both up. Now I only wake up Isabella because Emmy is usually waiting on me in the morning. Emmy is an early riser and Isabella is definitely not. Emmy sits at the kitchen table while I go into Isabella’s room, open the shades and turn on the lights and say, “get up, it’s time for breakfast.” I do this in a normal tone and go into the kitchen whether she gets up right away or not.

3. Breakfast – 10 minutes

Next, in my normal voice I say “it’s time to put your sticker on the calendar.” Emmy will jump up and run to the refrigerator to pick out a sticker. Isabella is usually in the kitchen by now. I didn’t always do the sticker ritual in the morning but, I had a hard time getting Isabella out of bed. Placing the stickers on the calendar first thing in the mornings has been a problem solver for me. It also sets the tone for the day. I remind them how well behaved and respectful they were to each other yesterday and how proud I am of their accomplishments. They love it and I love doing it! I put their vitamins out, give them their breakfast, which is usually cinnamon raisin toast with “I can’t believe it’s not butter” and a piece of fruit, and give them their juice in a Sippy cup. I put their juice in a Sippy cup to save time so they are not sitting at the table drinking juice for too long.

4. Getting dressed – 6 minutes

Emmy finishes breakfast first so we go into her room, with her Sippy cup, and get her dressed. Isabella eats slower so she tends to take longer at the table. I get her fully dressed, shoes and all. While I’m getting her dressed I lay out Isabella’s school clothes considering she dresses herself now. By the time I’m finished getting Emmy dressed Isabella is usually heading into her room to get ready. In the past Isabella would get preoccupied with playing so I took all of the toys out of their room and made a play room. The play room is where the toys go and no one is allowed there in the morning. Playing with toys in the morning is a time killer.

5. Brushing teeth – 4 minutes

Emmy and I head to the bathroom; we brush her teeth and then proceed to the kitchen table – where it all began. Usually, by then Isabella is heading into the bathroom to brush her teeth. We don’t waste time and mostly we are overlapping efforts like Emmy is getting dressed while Isabella is eating. In the beginning we did everything together and there was another mistake. I wasn’t dictating the tone or maximizing our efforts. I needed to take control.

6. Brushing hair – 2 minutes

This was my biggest hurdle. Although, as you can tell I had a lot of them and this was by far the toughest one. I’m a guy and I know exactly zero about barrettes, scrunchies, bows, ribbons, hair ties – I could go on and on. I have this pet peeve regarding the way parents present their kids in public. It drives me insane to see an unkempt kid. I don’t know how parents leave the house with their child looking some of the ways I’ve seen. I’ll save that topic for another post. Anyway, the hair would take me 15 minutes to get it right and even then it didn’t look messy. I didn’t know what to do? I took my mom’s advice and went to the salon and cut their hair. They both have a bob. It’s cute, easy to maintain, less tangles and I said to myself they have the rest of their lives to grow out their hair if they want. After the haircut it was easy. I went and purchased detangling spray to help them look very presentable in the morning. It gets the tangles out, wets their hair a little so it’s not frizzy and it smells nice. I purchase it at target in the health and beauty department.

7. Getting out the door – 3 minutes

After I brush Emmy’s hair we put on her backpack and she waits at the front door for Isabella. By then, Isabella is in the kitchen and sits down for me to brush her hair. After a couple of quick sprays with the detangler and a few quick strokes with the brush we head to the door. She puts on her backpack, I grab my stuff, which is always by the front door, and we head out.

I’m not going to say there are not bumps in the road. I am constantly reminding them of the time and getting them moving but I never raise my voice and always use positive reinforcement to motivate them. It took me a few weeks to get the entire morning down to a ½ hour and I’m sure you can do it as well. Good luck and let me know if it works for you.