What do you do on weekend mornings?

[MassiveBumperlicious]

Just wondering what you do when you are rudely awoken on a weekend morning by children and stumble bleary eyed downstairs? DH and I take it in turns for lie ins, so the aim is to keep pretty quiet, plus I am never at my best in the mornings.

DD (3yo) is currently on a Rugrats marathon, and I feel pretty bad, except I am 30 weeks pg and don't sleep very well at the moment.

How do you amuse your LOs in the morning (or more to the point how do you get them to amuse themselves!)?

[Seona1973]

tv, wii, nintendo - mine are nearly 4 and nearly 7.

[MassiveBumperlicious]

DD is a bit young for wii etc. I was hoping for easy ideas that didn't involve the TV, or just reassurance that everyone else parks their kids in front of it while they have a cup of tea and breakfast in peace!

[elliepac]

I wil provide the reassurance you need . On a weekend morning (not weekdays I hasten to add ), DS (6) gets himself up before anyone else (early riser), makes his own breakfast and goes and watches tv/play his wii, I then stumble downstairs when DD wakes up, get her breakfast, allow her to have it in the living room and deposit her in there with TV and DS. I then go and make a coffee, go to dining room and leave them to it until I come round . I know I am clearly a bad mother .

[Wordsonascreen]

Its ballet on saturday morning for dd (I take her) and a cricket match (4 hrs ..ick) on sunday morning for ds (dh takes him)

If its a nice day we'll all go to cricket and sit in the clubhouse with a cup of tea pint of lager

Its a bit cold this morning so I'm drinking my third cup of coffee and MNing whilst dd plays with her zhu zhu pets.

[Wordsonascreen]

Ballet is at 9am and cricket 8.45 am for a home match so the alarm goes off at 8am

[lovechoc]

dream of having a long lie...

if DH is off work then we have a relaxing morning after breakfast. Usually consists of watching TV. I sometimes do the ironing, washing, hoovering etc. Laze around.

If he's not off work then I just do everything like I normally do during the week because I don't have the extra help.

[luciemule]

have a relaxing time. The kids watch tv or play and I get on getting uniforms washed for the next week. For some reason, housework always seems less stressful at weekends.
Saturday afternoons we usually go somewhere for a walk or up to the woods.
Sundays, DH normally lies in and DD rides in the afternoon.
We try to do gardening evey weekend too - it de-stresses DH.

[EightiesChick]

More reassurance here!

My DS still has a longish daytime nap (he's 18 mos) and for some reason has that at around 10am weekends instead of lunchtime as he does at nursery. So we also take in turns to get up and generally it's TV interspersed with toy playing, 'reading' books and so on. We don't aspire to get out of the house till DS gets up from his nap at around 11.30/12. So no, I am not doing educational activities or anything particlarly worthy. This morning I got really bored with kids' TV and had an hour of Dynasty while DS played with noisy toys.

[Woobie]

DS is 10 months...Geta up at 5 ish (every morning weekday or weekend obviously,) DH works shifts, so sometimes needs to be in bed.
I get up, go into lounge with him, drink tea whilst sitting on floor "playing" with his toys - (with him of course, not on my own! )
I then count down the minutes until nap time at about 9am!

[compo]

Mine usually watch tv until 10am because that's when Milkshake on channel5 ends
in this time me and dh can have leisurely breakfast, I have a bath while he fiddles on the pc
then at ten we're ready to be out somewhere - park, shopping , beach, woods, bike ride, swimming: all dependant on theweather or sometimes one dc will have a party to go to

[notyummy]

DD has just turned 4 this weekend. For the past 18 months, the rabbit clock has reigned supreme in our house. When the rabbit wakes, she can come and get us, up until then, then she plays quietly herself in her room. Takes a bit of reinforcement to start with, but worth it!

It is set for 7am during the week and 7 40 at the weekend. As I am usually up at 615 for work during the week, so that is a big lie in for me. We then play, read stories and ocaasionally do tv- generally only about 10 minutes ir so before getting dressed and going downstairs for breakfast around 9 or 930.

[create]

Learn to embrace the early start and "use" the weekend as my mum would say?!

As soon as my DCs could recognise numbers they had a digital bedside clock and have known that they must not get out of bed (except for toilet) before the 7 appears, but we generally get up then whatever day of the week. TBH it does feel good to use the weekend, although I'm often in bed by 10pm on a Saturday night

[strandedatsea]

I can't understand how anyone can make their children stay in bed/in their rooms until they want them to get up? Mine just appear - usually as soon as the first bloody bird starts tweeting at around 5am (if we are really, really lucky we'll get a lie in until 6am).

I make coffee and sit on the balcony and gaze at the sea while they watch 5 on demand. It's the only time of the week they can watch "live" UK tv as the rest of the time the broadband connection is too slow..

[RhinestoneCowgirl]

I just get up, get them breakfast, drink coffee etc. Then I do some chores while they play/chase each other/come to blows (DS nearly 4yrs and DD 18 months).

DH gets up later, but does tend to do night waking at weekends (and is a grumpy arse in the mornings). If I'm really knackered I'll go back bed for an hour or so when he gets up.

[PlanetEarth]

We used to let them come in our bed with us. If we were lucky they'd doze off again and so would we . Of course sometimes they'd just bounce around and climb over us...

[RhinestoneCowgirl]

With just DS he would have come into bed with us and dozed off, no probs. DD on the other hand.... not a snuggler

[MrsMalcolmTucker]

TV from 5am in this house. Sometimes I make the little blighters watch BBC breakfast news for an hour, if I wake up grumpy. Then we watch their crap for an hour, then I turn the TV off while I stomp about making breakfast.

[FairyMum]

I get up with the children while DH has a lie-in. We bring our duvets downstairs and cuddle up on the sofa watching childrens tv for an hour. I drink coffee to try to wake up. The children eat ice cream

When I have had enough coffee to wake up, we bake bread for breakfast, wake DH at 10 and sit down to eat breakfast. We are reaaaaly slow at weekends.....

[PowderMum]

DD2 now 11 has always been an earlier riser, this is great during the week, but I really don;t need to get up at 6 at the weekend.
She has from a very early age learnt how to play in her room or to go down and watch TV/have breakfast.
I really don;t see any harm in her chilling on the sofa until 8am when everyone else wants to get up

[dyzzidi]

I have the opposite problem dd will not get out of bed at the weekend and will say'pleae mummy leave me alone i want to have lie in' she can't get up for school during the week either. It drives me insane, she goes to bed at 7pm and still wants more than 12 hours sleep a night. At a weekend she can easily do 14 hours straight sleep.

She is 4 by the way so god help me when she is a teenager.

[GirlWithTheMouseyHair]

we take it in turns for a lie in too - parent getting up usually plonks cbeebies on, which can get an extra 30mins snooze time before DS insists on us playing with him (20months). When it's DH's turn for a lie in, DS and I normally go out to the local greasey spoon for bacon butties, when it's my turn they thunder round our small flat like a herd of elephants

[MrsMc82]

More reassurance here too and DS is only 6mo - tho we do the baby equivalent of plonking him in front of the tv and after his 6.30/7am milk and feeding him breakfast we plonk him on his huge playmat with a few toys and let him roll around playing till its his nap time....... Meanwhile I sit on the sofa watching morning telly (and keep half an eye on DS rolling around), drink several coffees and DH makes his legendary bacon and egg butties for us both.... if we time it right we'll go back to bed too while DS has his nap - bliss!!!!

[whatname]

same as on a week day, only difference is H is upstairs in bed on weekend

[RatherBeOnThePiste]

DD goes to swimming club at 6.45 on a Saturday morning!