Toothpaste gate – a typical morning for working families

The goal:  everyone needs to leave the house – 2 children to get to school by 8:45 latest, one baby to nursery, 2 adults to go to work.  How hard can it be?

The alarm goes off, 7:00.  Hit snooze.  Baby D came in at midnight and I tossed and turned with him in the bed until 5am when he would not be pacified anymore and wanted to sit up and chat – loudly.   And crawl around the bed.   He fell asleep at 6:15, think I dozed off around 6:30.

7.10 hit snooze.   Phoebe comes in and thankfully goes out again.  Snooze until 7.30 – remind DH he needs to get up.   7.40 – tell DH he really should get up if he has any hope of getting the kids to school on time.   7.45 – he begrudgingly gets up. I don’t have to go until slightly later but end up getting up too to help. Baby D is awake.  I get cross that I’m doing it all again when I told him to get up on time.   I get breakfast for the 2 older ones – usual struggle trying to get them to commit to a breakfast choice – should I give them a choice?  Probably not.  DH appears like a bear with a sore head, barks at them to get dressed.  Confused, they are trying to eat breakfast then they try to comply with getting dressed.  I am muttering under my breath about how he should have got up, he needs to be more responsible – this does not help.  I get dressed and shove some toast in for myself.  I help William get dressed, he’s struggling to get his pants on the right way round – I tell him once he gets to 7 (he’s 6) he has to get dressed by himself – well, here’s hoping.  DH has managed to get Phoebe dressed, I start looking for her hairbrush, last seen with Baby D who has proudly learnt what a hairbrush is for and loves to carry it around brushing his fuzzy hair – v. cute but he transports it into places unknown.  I find the hairbrush behind the kitchen door aka no-mans land.  Start plaiting her hair, Baby D now has hold of P’s toothpaste (no lid) and toothbrush.  He knows what this does too, I manage to rescue the toothpaste before he squeezes it all out, let him have the toothbrush, figure it will be a good teething toy and he can brush his own teeth, win-win.  One plait down, glance over at Baby D, he’s frothing at the mouth a bit and using the toothbrush as a drum stick on our sofa, small wet patch appears (we got leather sofas some years back, fabric sofas are a no-no with children, at least for me).  I place the hairbrush down next to me and said wet patch, DH comes in with coffee, I barely notice him in my tired morning confused state, he sits down on the hairbrush and looks at me like I’m the worst sort of human – I’d barely noticed the wet bit and was laughing at him sitting on a prickly hairbrush!  He shouts, “Why didn’t you clear that up?!” Clear what up, I thought?  Ah, the toothpaste/spit patch!  I explain I was doing P’s hair and hadn’t had the time to reach out one of my other arms to the kitchen and get a cloth etc.  He moves to the armchair with a growl.  I worry about his blood pressure.  We’ve forgotten to get cat food, it’s run out – give them a slice of ham each to pacify them.  Somehow manage to get them ready, I dress the baby ready for nursery, the children are loaded into DH’s car.  I see his sandwiches for lunch on the side, forgotten and forlorn.  I grab my toast and eat it on the way to work in the car.

Every day both of us think we need to be more organised.  We try, we have a box for their schoolbags, kit needed, books and things, we have their coats and shoes in a cupboard.  Even on rare days when we’re out and ready on time, there’s always something that holds us up – delays getting shoes on, finding shoes, ‘I need gloves,’ ‘and my special hat,’ ‘no not that one,’ ‘I need a poo,’ a meltdown (from me) or something else bizarre.  Yes, we should get up earlier but even when I do there’s a complacency vibe and we still get that rushing around like headless chickens part.  I’ve had various suggestions: