Getting Out the Door in the Morning

I was talking to one of my colleagues at work the other day. She lives quite a distance from our school and I commented that she must have to get up really early to make it to school for our 7:30 am start time. She replied, "No. I just shower and go." Ah, yes, life without children. I vaguely remember that. Obviously, getting yourself out of the house while getting children out of the house at the same time presents more of a challenge.

Here are some tips for making that challenge a little bit easier:

1) Do everything that can be done the night before the night before - make lunches, iron and lay out clothes for the next day.

2) Make sure homework is done and in the correct folder in the correct backpack (obviously older kids can take responsibility for this themselves). The same goes for any signed papers that have to go back to school.

3) If you can, get up before your children so that you have time to get yourself put together before dealing with child morning stress. I set my alarm for 5:30 am. I actually roll out of bed at 5:45, get dressed and say my morning prayers before the children get up at 6:30.

4) Make sure your kids know the morning routine. In our house breakfast has to be done by 7 am at which point it is time to go to the bathroom, brush teeth, get dressed (I find it better to have them eat before they get dressed - if food is dropped on themselves it lands on their pajamas rather than their school clothes) and get out of the house by 7:15 am (thankfully, we live relatively close to school).


5) Allow a little bit of wiggle room in your routine. Make sure you have at least 5 extra minutes in there somewhere to allow for the unexpected.