Banishing Morning Chaos
September 4, 2009 by BlairFiled Under Time
by Blair Massey
Does your family struggle with being on time in the morning? Are you tired of nagging, yelling, policing and rushing? Imagine how enjoyable your mornings would be if everyone was ready on time? Maybe you’re thinking to yourself, “That will never happen with my family”. Take heart, there is hope! You can banish the chaos in your morning routine by following these eight simple strategies.
1. Adjust Your Departure Time
By backing up your departure time a few minutes, you can avoid any persistent morning delays. For example, let’s say that every morning right before you head out the door your 14 year old daughter decides she hates what she’s wearing and runs to change her outfit. Her daily wardrobe change consistently puts your departure time fifteen minutes behind schedule. Instead of being late every day, be proactive by setting your departure time back by fifteen minutes. That way when she heads back to her room to change her outfit, you’ll still be on time with a fifteen minute cushion built into your schedule.
2. Make an Adjustment to Your “Sleepyhead’s” Wake-up Time
If you have a child that is constantly late because he likes to hit the snooze button, try setting his alarm to go off 15 minutes earlier. That way he will wake up at the proper time. This also works very well for adults!
3. Make a Get Ready Chart
Help your children know exactly what they need to do to get ready by making a chart that lists all the necessary steps. If you have very young children, make a chart with pictures. When my son was five, I had him make pictures of each thing he had to do to get ready in the morning: get dressed, make bed, eat breakfast, comb hair, brush teeth, get lunch and backpack. Then we cut them out and put them in order on a piece of construction paper which I laminated and put on the refrigerator. Every morning he would look at his chart to see if he had completed his steps.
4. Set up a Bathroom Schedule
If your family fights every morning over access to the bathroom, try setting up a schedule that designates specific times for each person to use the bathroom. You can eliminate these squabbles altogether if you have your children take a shower or bath the night before.
5. Train Them to Be Ready Early
Being on time is great but that doesn’t leave you with any cushion if there is a last minute snag. Without a cushion there is no time to spare and everyone is stressed and rushed. Why not train your children to be early? You can do this by motivating them with a reward. Make it a rule that if they are completely ready and it is still early, they can watch a cartoon or play for the remaining time they have left. This has worked beautifully with our son.
6. Prepare the Night Before.
Instead of trying to do all your preparations in the morning, get as much done possible the night before. Preparing the night before will greatly reduce the stress in your morning routine because you will have completed most of your work in advance.
Below is a general list of things to prepare the night before. Have your children take responsibility for as many of these as possible, according to their age and ability.
- Pack up backpacks (school books, library books, homework, permission slips, etc.).
- Pack lunches. Don’t forget to include water bottles and midmorning snacks.
- Set the table with plates, bowls, cups and utensils for tomorrows breakfast. Set out the cereal or breakfast bars. Adults or older children can portion out vitamins for each child.
- Everyone should lay out their clothes, including underwear, socks, shoes and accessories. Help little ones to learn this skill by doing it with them.
- Round up sports equipment, gym bags and other things needed for after school and after work activities.
- Adults can round up things for work such as their briefcase, work files, laptop and equipment.
Have each person set their things by the door they leave through in the morning. In the morning all they need to do is to grab their lunch, backpack and other stuff, and off they go.
7. Send Them as They Are.
If I catch my son dawdling I remind him that I will take him to school in whatever state of readiness he is in at the time. That means if he is still in his pajamas, or his hair is not combed, that is how he will go to school. When I first explained this to him, he thought I was joking. One day he decided to test me to see if I was serious. I gave him a ten minute warning to finish getting ready. When it was time to go he was still in his pajamas. I packed his clothes, tooth brush, toothpaste and comb in a paper bag and herded him out the door. He was stunned that I had actually done what I said I was going to do. Once in the car he quickly changed his clothes. When we arrived at school he brushed his teeth and combed his hair in the bathroom. From them on, when I would remind him what would happen if he wasn’t ready on time, he would jump up and get ready. In fact, you never saw a little boy get ready for school so fast!
8. Set Your Clocks Ahead
If all else fails, try setting all your clocks ahead by however many minutes your crew is consistently late. Now you can smile knowing that when they think they are late, they are really on time.
Getting your family out of the house on time is not as unattainable as it may seem. By implement these eight simple strategies you can turn a stressful morning into a peaceful and smooth exit out the door.
WANT TO USE THIS ARTICLE IN YOUR EZINE OR WEB SITE? You can, as long as you include the entire following resource information at the end of the article and make the link back to our site live:
© 2002 – 2009 Blair Massey
Christian Lifestyle expert Blair Massey is devoted to helping Christian women around the world organize and manage their home, family and life. If you’re tired of struggling to keep up at home, Blair will show you how to unlock your God-given organizing ability so that you can start living the amazing life that God created you to enjoy! To learn how, sign up for her FREE newsletter now at www.christian-homemaking.com
» Print This post