Early Mornings with the Toompi :)

Here's a glimpse into our mornings.

 My motto, much like Mary Poppins (who we all know is practically perfect in every way) is "A place for everything and everything in it's place"

The key to having many children and still functioning is... say it with me... organization! 

When my house is unorganized, I am crazy. My house can't run, I can't find things, people are late, etc. True story.

I know when you look at this list you'll be surprised and think we're really rushing around, but we're not at all. If we can stick with this routine then it's actually very peaceful. The time is more like a guidline, the kids mostly do everything in order. 

6:30AM: My alarm goes off. Last year Jerry burned a CD of the song, "wake up boo" and it plays in our CD player every morning. It's pretty quiet but wakes us up - we have a rule, you have to be out of bed before the song ends. 

The end of the song is pretty annoying so the only misfortune of staying in bed longer than the song is that it plays again.

 6:45: Brush my teeth, shower, get dressed, brush my hair. If Iris is awake and crying - I'm horrible. I leave her until 7. Lucy is also in her crib and Molly stays in their room and they usually play. If Iris is crying real crying not like whiny I want up crying then Jerry gets her and gives her milk on the couch.

 7:00: Turn on worship music, fill and turn on the kettle. Make coffee. I make Molly's lunch.

   

We don't watch television in the morning. My kids turn into zombies and someone doesn't like what someone else is watching. Then they fight. NO TV! Babies get diaper changes after milk. I've been feeding my kids peanut butter toast and instant oatmeal almost every morning this fall. It's so fast and easy to make and they eat it really well. On Saturdays we have eggs and toast, on Sundays Daddy makes pancakes.

 7:15: Jerry "goes" to work. Molly, Lucy, and Iris eat breakfast. They make a huge mess so I leave them in jammies. I do the dishes and start a load of laundry while they eat.

 7:30: I wake up the boys. They go into the bathroom brush their teeth, hair, and wash their face. Sam is supposed to bring down the laundry and straighten the bathroom. (doesn't always happen!)

 7:45: Sam and Joe get dressed.

   

This is our family closet. I cannot say enough things about having a family closet. 

 1. I can fold and put their clothes away 1 million times faster. 

 2. We had dressers in the kids' rooms before but in the process of getting dressed and/or times of being a bit mischievous they would empty their drawers and it would make me so irritated that I'd have to fold them all AGAIN. 

 3. I can get everyone's clothes out when we're in a hurry or when I just don't have the patience to wait for them to get dressed, really quickly. Everything is there. It's perfect.

 8:00: Boys get jackets and shoes on and check their homeowrk board for things to bring to school. This is where I put ALL the kids' homework. They can grab their clip boards and work on homework and return it to the same place. If I find homework laying around the house it has somewhere to go and hopefully wont get lost. 

The top left where the hand print currently is, is OPS calendar, though I don't know where it is. And the top right clip board is for Molly's preschool calendar. under that is Sam, Joe, and Molly's homework clip boards. 

   

I switch the laundry over to the dryer and start a second load.

 8:18: Boys leave for the bus.

I switch the laundry over and quickly fold the load that's out of the dryer. My goal is three loads a day, but most days I do two.

 8:30: Molly, Lucy, and Iris get dressed.

Girls hair! 

 

 

Molly gets the kaboodle down from the bathroom counter. This contains everything (there is also a spray bottle that has water that is supposed to be in it - CURRENTLY MISSING) they need for their hair and I do their hair in the living room. I've found the least amount of running from one room to another looking for things seriously decreases time wasted. I do Molly's hair first and when she's done she does her chore, which is cleaning the living room floor, basically just picking up toys. This works really well for us because I move around a lot during the day and don't ever have that one time where I can sit and over see her doing her chore. Lucy's hair takes a long time. Think about trying to tame Medusa's hair, it's like that with more screaming and thrashing about. I do their hair every morning. I really think it teaches them discipline and it is so worth it getting their hair done. I even brush Iris' spider web hair with a really soft bristle hair brush.

 8:30: Molly and Lucy get socks and shoes on. This can take about 10 or 15 minutes, no joke.

[Sock] pockets from ikea ($3.99)

   

Shoe shelf (which is way too small and we're going to get a new one soon!)

9:00: I put Iris to bed. She sleeps from 9 - 1 or 2 every day. It's great that she can nap and we can go out without her. ;)

 

Then the girls get their coats on and Molly gets her backpack for preschool. She has preschool three days a week so I like to stick to this routine every morning. On Tuesdays we go to toddler story time at the library, or to the Zoo, or the children's museum, or somewhere else that is fun and gets us out. We're ready, why not? 

 So that's our morning schedule!

I've found that when you're starting a new routine it can take about a week of lots of errors. Adjust your schedule as needed, give yourself time for coffee or whatever you need to in the morning. If you "time" your kids and see it takes 10 minutes for shoes to go on add 3 minutes for dilly dallying. It happens - daily.

How do you organize your mornings?