Whether you are a stay at home parent or a working parent, mornings with kids can be downright crazy. Even if you are an extremely organized person and have a morning routine in place, things happen. Your child could wake up with a stomach bug or want to discuss where babies come from in the middle of breakfast. Just like Ellie Goulding sings, “Anything could happen.” Speaking of music, I’m a total music junkie and I love to come up with playlists of my day. What that means is I create playlists that tell my day’s story. Each playlist is unique, because each song represents something that happened that day. Just like most parents, I have a lot going on in my life, so my playlist can get pretty long. Here’s what just my morning playlist looks like:
6:30 Wake Up and Get Ready – “Everything Is Awesome” from The Lego Movie
Okay, so I wake up more like 6:37, because I always hit that oh-so-tempting snooze button on my alarm clock. Hey, it’s there for a reason! Seven minutes of sleep doesn’t seem like much, but to an exhausted mother of two girls under the age of seven, it can mean seven minutes in Heaven. I can either wake up like Cruella De vil at 6:30 or squeeze in an extra seven minutes and wake up like Mary Poppins. After I wake up and visit Jim (I call my toilet Jim, so that I can tell people I go to the “Jim” every morning), I put on clothes that best flatter my post-baby body (and yes, I am well aware of the fact that my youngest “baby” is three years old). I quickly brush my teeth, do my makeup, and fix my hair. Gone are the days when I actually took the time to perfectly curl my eyelashes and make sure every hair was in place. Nowadays, I look in the mirror and make sure the bags under my eyes are concealed and my hair doesn’t completely look like a rat’s nest.
6:45 Get Kids Ready For School – “Livin’ La Vida Loca,” by Ricky Martin
If my daughters aren’t already awake, I wake them up. First, I gently caress their back while I say in a soft loving voice, “Time to wake up, sweetie.” After doing this three or four times with nothing so much as a wiggle from them, I look at my watch, panic, and then frantically pull the sheets off of them. Let the first yelling of the day commence! “Wake up! We’re going to be late!” My six year old then argues with me about not wanting to wear her school uniform and how going to school is the worst thing in her life. She literally does this every day. Can you say Drama Queen? My three year old lets me pick out her clothes, which saves me a lot of time (and my sanity), but she isn’t quite coordinated enough yet to dress herself. One time, she got her head stuck in her shirt and ran into the wall. After I dress my daughter, I make sure my kids brush their teeth and then they step into Salon Mommy, where I am requested to do their hair like Elsa’s and Doc McStuffins’. That being said, trying to convince my kids to brush their teeth is not as easy as you might think! There are no doubts about it, encouraging your kids to take care of their oral hygiene can be incredibly tricky. However, it is no secret that alongside regular trips to a dental practice such as Main Street Dental, children need to brush their teeth at least twice a day to avoid common issues like tooth decay and cavities. With this in mind, I try to keep the morning routine for my kids as fun as possible by putting on some upbeat music while they brush their teeth. Anyway, after my customers are satisfied (I receive no tip by the way), I make them breakfast and by “make,” I mean pour Cheerios and milk into a bowl for them. While they’re eating, I’m putting my daughter’s snack into her backpack, feeding our fish, and getting in a shot of espresso before we head out.
7:30 Take The Kids To School – “I Drive Myself Crazy,” by *NSYNC
I get my kids and their backpacks into the car. I begin to buckle the three year old in her carseat, who then starts whining, because she “wanted to do it like a big girl!” Okay, fine. I force a smile and let her try. This is taking forever! The six year old announces she is done buckling herself by annoyingly shouting, “I won!” Now the three year old is crying. I turn to her and say, “Oh, you didn’t lose, sweetie. Look, Mommy isn’t buckled yet. You beat Mommy!” The three year old is happy again and continues to try to buckle herself. I check the six year old’s buckle to make sure it is secure. It isn’t. I fix it. Back to the three year old. I tell her, “Good job, sweetie,” give her an obnoxiously loud and bright toy to distract her from continuing to try to buckle herself, and then I secure her buckle. I get into the driver’s seat, turn on the ignition, and buckle up. On our way to the six year old’s school, I quiz her on her spelling words and remind her that she is going to have hot lunch today. I give her a hug and kiss before she walks into the school with her class. Then, I drive the three year old to preschool. While waiting in the line of mostly minivans, I see that children are walking into the school with toys. I see a penguin stuffed animal, a princess doll, a puzzle… Hey, all of these things start with letter P. Oh, crap! It’s Show and Tell today! It’s too late to go back home and have my daughter pick something out that starts with the letter P, so I begin to frantically search my car for something, anything, that begins with letter P. We’re almost at the front of the line and that’s when I see it. On the floor next to some Goldfish Cracker crumbs and broken crayons is a bright and shiny penny! It’s only one cent, but I feel like I just struck gold! Yes! Mom of the Year right here! I bring my daughter into the preschool, help her hang up her backpack, give her a hug and kiss, and send her off to Circle Time with her lucky penny!
8:30 Unload Dishwasher – “Cups,” by Anna Kendrick
I drive back home and am kid-free, so I crank up Meghan Trainor’s new album. I begin to sing along and “shake it like I’m supposed to do” while I clean up the half-eaten bowls of Cheerios. I open the dishwasher and all I see are cups, cups, cups. Elsa cups. Strawberry Shortcake cups. Sofia The First cups. Apparently, if there is a cup with a girl cartoon character on it, we own it. There are only two children in my house and one of them is gone for seven hours a day, but somehow, they seem to each accumulate an average of six cups every single day. Instead of using the same cup they had to get more water, they will get a brand new cup, because they don’t know where they put their original cup! At the end of the day, I make my rounds and I find cups in the strangest places. Once, I found a cup of milk inside of our coat closet. I don’t know how long the milk had been in there, but the smell was so horrible! I had to use a whole can of Febreze to get rid of the smell!
8:40 Laundry and Other Housework – “Maniac,” by Michael Sembello
I wish I could be dancing like Alex in Flashdance, but instead, I’m busily doing the laundry, which includes matching teeny tiny socks and making sure my husband has enough clean black socks to last him through the workweek. Wearing white socks with black dress shoes is the worst! I pay our never-ending bills and do some filing. During this time, I moan about how expensive our bills are and how, if it carries on like this, it could have an effect on our savings. Just looking at my electricity bills, I know that something needs to be done, so maybe I should start looking for the cheapest electric company in my area to see if we can save a bit of money on it. We NEED electricity as, without it, the laundry and any other jobs I need to get done in a day’s work won’t get finished. How does that help anyone? After this session, I decide to turn my mind back to the other things I need to do. So, then, I dust and vacuum downstairs. I go upstairs and pick up the 100+ toys all over the kids’ rooms, so nobody trips and falls. I am convinced that stepping on a Lego and falling down our stairs will be the death of me. On my grave, it will read, “Everything is NOT awesome!”
9:40 Contact The Outside World – “Call Me Maybe,” by Carly Rae Jepsen
I read and respond to emails and make some phone calls. I make a dentist appointment for me, send an email to my daughter’s choir teacher, and call my mom to chat for a bit, which is mostly just me telling her about the cute and funny things her granddaughters have done lately. I check Facebook to see what’s going on with my friends and family. I see Jenny’s family is on vacation in Hawaii again. Wish I could afford that. I see Alicia has gotten her nails done for the fourth time this month. Wish I could afford that too. I look down at my own plain nails and let out a sigh.
10:00 Work – “Roar,” by Katy Perry
Time for another shot of espresso before I get to work! I’m a blogger, so I blog. I won’t bore you with the details, so… typity, type, type, blogidy blog, blog! I put my college degree and writing and research skills to use by writing a fantastic article about parenting. I post it, link it, tweet it, and hope for the best!
11:00 Exercise – “Girls Just Wanna Have Fun,” by Cyndi Lauper
I take a break from blogging and get into my cute yoga pants. I break a sweat exercising on the elliptical for 30 minutes. Oh, who am I kidding? I didn’t exercise. I did get into my yoga pants though and break open a can of Pringles while I watched an episode of 30 Rock on Netflix. (“Bet you can’t watch just one!” No, wait. That’s not right…). All jokes aside though, I do want to start incorporating more exercise into my daily routine! My best friend has suggested that we take up yoga together. She is currently training to be a yoga instructor so wants to get in as much practice as she can. I do want to focus more on my health now so perhaps it could be the right time to give yoga a go? I already have a few songs in mind that would be perfect for a yoga workout actually. Watch this space!
11:30 Lunch with My Preschooler – “What Do You Mean,” by Justin Bieber
My daughter is already back from preschool and she has enough sand in her shoes to make our own mini sandbox. I ask her if she had a good day at school and she answers “Yes” in her cute little voice. I ask her what she did at school and who she played with. All I get is “I don’t know.” I help her wash her hands and then I ask her what she wants to eat for lunch. You would think I would know by now to not give my kids choices, but no. She says she wants a Mickey Mouse waffle. “No, sweetie. Waffles are for breakfast.” She then asks for pancakes. “No, honey. Pancakes are a breakfast food too.” I can see the little wheels in her head turning. She then asks for spaghetti and meatballs. Are you serious, child? I look through our pantry. No spaghetti, but I see a ton of macaroni and cheese boxes. I ask her in an excited voice, “Oooh! How about mac and cheese?” She yells “Yay” and jumps up and down! Ding, ding! We have a winner! I let her watch her Kindle while I make lunch. Why is Caillou’s voice so damn annoying? We do “cheers” with our spoons and we eat our delicious mac and cheese together. It’s the cheesiest! I make sure the only hole in her head the food is going in is her mouth. (Beans have made their way in my daughter’s nose before.)
And that ladies and gentlemen was my morning’s playlist! What would your morning’s playlist be?