My friend asked me how I was able to fit in a walk and get the kids ready in the morning. Up until 6 months ago, I got all 4 kids ready by myself. Now, hubby is getting up earlier so he can share this job with me and get himself ready for work – I can slip out and have a bit of “me-time” in the morning

I have done my morning schedule in lots of different ways over the years. When I had a children that were fussy about their clothes, I would TRY and remember to get them to pick their clothes the night before. If I had a baby that needed feeding in the morning, I would usually try and get a lot done the night before (lunches, bags etc) because I knew that I would have to sit down for a good portion of the time to either feed solids or breastfeed. The other children were usually too young to do a lot of things themselves.  Now that I have older children (particularly my 6 and 8 year old) can help out more. My hubby is an organised man, and printed out a schedule that they follow each morning. It is now like clock work for them. What is amazing is that they do their chores without needing to do a sticker chart, or tick something off (like I got them to do when they were younger) They just look at the time and what needs to be done next, and do it! wooo hooo! (hubby really put the time in to show them how to do it, and still keeps them on track when their mind goes wandering)

My most recent routine looks like this:
5.45am: wake up, get dressed into walking gear, say prayers etc
6am: I do an hour of data entry (my dad is working on an internet website that lists hotels, attractions etc)
7am: I go for a walk (Hubby  gets the kids breakfast and makes sandwiches. The DD8 gets the fruit for the lunchboxes, DD6 gets crackers, cheese, biscuits etc for lunchboxes. DD6 and DD8 clear half the dishwasher each.)
7.20am: I have a shower and get dressed
7.45am: Family study. It’s called family study, but it’s more like family time where we come together for family prayer, sing songs, sometimes have talks about values and scripture stories etc.  DD8 is memorising the articles of faith for her primary activity. They will get ice cream scoops and toppings for every article of faith they know. So we are learning them together as a family since hubby’s mum put some of them to music years ago.
8.15am: Hubby leaves for work, I get kids dressed and ready for school and any last minute running around! (you know the drill…finding socks, jackets and stray shoes etc etc)

So hubby and I agreed that I would do the data entry in the morning while he feeds the kids and start getting lunches ready. I decided to get up earlier and do the data entry first, and then the walk etc later since it was waaay too dark at 6am.

If the weather is bad, I usually sleep in a bit! (which works well, because I usually have gone to bed WAY too late the night before!)

PS. Now you must understand, I AM NOT a morning person! I try and sleep in as much as possible. Heck, I would sleep in until 10am (*cough* or later) if I could! So waking up before 7am used to be just CRAZY! I can’t believe I even contemplated waking before 6am!! But I must admit, the walk is worth it. Just getting out and getting some fresh air, some perspective and knowing that I accomplished something, makes me able to set my alarm clock for that crazy time! I sometimes stray from my schedule on days where I just didn’t get a good sleep….but I find as long as I can get up before the kids, the morning usually goes smoothly – well as smoothly as a morning can with young children!!