Please share your 3yo morning getting ready routines because holy h*** I’m exhausted

[steelblue71]

@priya12 Just here to say I feel this. My 2.5 year old loves her Montessori school and she never wants to leave at pickup. But she fights going every day

 

[bb1212]

@priya12 I think you need to back track. What is happening at the 15 minute mark? What have you said? What’s the routine? This is where the conflict is.

You can take the biggest hurdle and make it first. Kid gets dressed first thing. Then eats. Then brushes teeth. Then you leave.

Visual charts help a TON. Have little pictures where kiddo follows each step. Practice the routine a few times together and when kiddo finishes make a big deal about their success.

Also create a game when walking to school. I might say “as soon as you’re ready we can walk to school and play I spy.” You can also listen to music, dance to school, look for flowers or animals, collect rocks… but you might need to leave some extra time for that.

 

[kk4him]

@priya12 Are your 3 days MWF by any chance?

We started our kid M/Th and the unpredictability was really tough on him. In retrospect, I wished we had done consecutive days to start - he did much better when we transitioned him to M-F.

 

[rocksinmyhead]

@priya12 Rushing around always throws our whole house off, so we’ve worked hard at slowing it down. Our kiddo loves to get dressed the second she wakes up (why? I don’t know). So 45 mins - 1hr before we need to leave, we pack a lunch together. We brush teeth together. She just figured out how to do socks by herself, so that process gets started early and she picks them out. She helps my very pregnant ass pick out clothes, seeing she’s already dressed. We pick out clips/ do hair right before we are out the door. Basically I’m getting at keeping kiddo occupied while also not rushing. Kids feed off stress. As for the tantrum, as hard as it is, set a boundary, stick to it. Ours hated leaving for preschool for almost the first 2 months. Every. Day. So I started saying “ this is what we’re doing. You’re going to school, yup! You’ll see all your friends” or “ you have to wear clips in your hair to school, you can choose 2 or 3 colors, but you have to have them so you can see to play.” and one day all the fight stopped because I was honestly relentless bout it ( as exhausting as it was). Now it’s honestly fun to get ready for school. If yours keeps demanding carrying, find something short and sweet like “ you’ve got strong legs! Let’s see who can walk faster to school!” Or “ you chose xyz shoes today, do they have super power speed?!” It’s EXHAUSTING but sometimes weird things like that really thrill kids and they start thinking of their own funny things to do. Good luck!

 

[leland170]

@priya12 We set up a timer. My toddler for some reason likes 11 mins lol. We do the routine - breakfast, change clothes, then we tell him he has 11 mins to play.. set them alarms and when timer goes off, he’s ready for shoes and out the door. the alarm works like a charm

 

[rmjuarez12]

@priya12 Maybe try having a basket with small toys or something that she can only play with on the walk/drive to school? That way it’s something exciting, she gets to pick one on the way out the door, and it goes back home with you but comes to pick up? I find little distractions like this make it easier to keep things moving but they still get a say.

And some days they just don’t want to go, but once they get there it’s fine. I feel the same about work some days.

 

[lacey65]

@priya12 I set aside 7 complete outfits for the week. She wakes up and comes to my room. She takes her medication, and we eat cereal. After breakfast, we go to choose her clean outfit for the day. Then she sits on my bed while I quickly brush and style her hair. We usually have 30 min after that before we leave. Her coat, backpack, and shoes are all near each other, so we put them on and I carry her to the car. School is across a very busy street, and 2 kids were hit by cars last year. So we choose to drive her each day.

 

[swhnj]

@priya12 I had similar issues with my two (now 5 and 2.5) and what helped was getting as much ready the night before as I could. So my son could pick out his outfit and knew that he could not change his mind in the morning. I gave them two options for breakfast the night before and would prep that if it could be prepped. I leave extra time and if it means sitting in the car and extra few minutes so be it. I don't bother with jackets until we get to school because they're so bulky my kids hate wearing jackets in their car seats. Bags are packed with winter gear and in the car the night before. It means I miss out on 15 minutes of no kid alone time but it did help make mornings easier.

 

[cooldudetothemaxlol]

@priya12 I wake my girl at 8:30 and we are pulling up to the school at 8:45. The way I wake her is by putting pants on her, and sometimes a shirt if what she wore to bed is too pajama-y. Then I carry her downstairs and put her right into my car, strap her in, then give her a breakfast smoothie to go.