I love my children but I hate weekends with them

She didn’t say her kids were dull. Stop being rude.

Get a membership e.g. English heritage, zoo, merlin, museum. It can be your weekend thing as a family. One year of making the most of it then as you say next summer will be very different.

Don’t be a dick. Parenting young kids is relentlessly hard. You know this.

3 years is fun, but 1 is I agree super boring, i did struggle with the baby stage. 3 up to 8 is really fun, and now I have a 9 year old who thinks she is a teenager and too cool for, well pretty much everything that we suggest 😂

Maybe post on your local Facebook group to ask for suggestions of cheap local day out

I do think it's partly a question of mindset. When I was a teacher, the more positive and upbeat teachers got the best results out of their classes, as they set the tone of expecting things to go well and then they did. I think if you try to plan activities, however small, free or local, and try to see weekends as opportunities, it will help. I am not saying it's not tough, I just think it helps.

It’s really hard. Especially those ages

Have you tried planning a weekend around what you want to do and slotting them in around that?

Do you get time just for you? Constantly working or looking after young children is tough, but it's even harder if there's no me time.
If you can find something you really enjoy maybe it won't be so hard with the kids because you have your me time to look forward to.
My eldest two have the same age gap as yours and it wasn't easy although by the time they were 4 and 6 it was great.
They loved being outdoors, going to anywhere with animals or National Trust places. The best thing was though they could hold a proper conversation and no more of me saying oh look a cow.
Of course they did (still do) bicker but were so much better if they weren't coped up inside.

I used to dread weekends with my DDs; DH had to do 7hrs of travel every other Sunday so I'd just look at all these hours I had to fill with horror.

I'm not sure I cracked it during that period - I certainly felt better if we'd done something but the idea of organising anything and actually getting them out of the house with all the shit that they needed, and dealing with naps and snacks and everything out and about, made me tired before we even left the house.

They are 8 and 11 now and a joy to take out (albeit very expensive as they eat adult meals and need a drink from every shop we pass lest they dehydrate 😂). I have no advice, except to say you're not the only person who feels like this, and it gets so much better.

Are you a single parent?
You’re making comments that seem to suggest you are, like not being able to bend or carry the 1 year old at the park, but you haven’t actually said whether you are or not.
Obviously ideas and suggestions for how easy or fun a weekend activity is will depend on if there’s another adult there or not.

I hear you. Life was actually pretty easy when DC2 was a newborn. He was of the sleepy, easygoing variety and he just came along for the ride. Weekends with my then 2-3 year old were enjoyable because we got out loads to places I actually found very interesting, like kids museums or city centre libraries or decent parks and DC2 came along in the sling. I could play with DC1 as DC2 couldn’t move and was happy to be held by anyone!

A 4 year old and a 1 year old is proving significantly more difficult as their needs are so different! Playing with DC1 is now really tricky as DC2 needs so much supervision. DC2 does get put in the playpen but he’s screaming after 10 minutes. Basically, age 1-2 is tricky as they can move but have so little interest in things. It’s even harder when you add a bigger child into the mix.

It will get easier. They will converge more as DC2 leaves the baby stage. My SIL doesn’t struggle anywhere near as much now with her 4 and 7 year old!

Oh I didn't mean that, I was wondering if we could make suggestions that would fit ion with your interests/hobbies while also being appropriate for the little ones!

Dont worry. You are having the repetitive days.bwent through the same thing and the only thing I can say is that you don't have to embrace what they want to do all the time. Obviously I don't know everything about your life. But when money is tight for me because kids activities are highly expensive I would take them to different parks, and make the journey part the exciting thing for me pointing out things to myself and looking around. At the park it was then their time for fun. Shops were a no no because it would end up with me bored looking for something to buy. At the age your kids are they just want to repeat the same things constantly because it gave them fun last time. They .have more patience than I. There were. Few great milestones which I look back at. The first time not having the buggy with me was one of the best, the first time I didn't have to worry about the kids needing the toilet every 30 minutes (kids were all girls so it was always the problem of having to take the girls into male toilets, because I couldn't leave 1 girl outside by herself and I couldn't go into the women's toilet. Luckily a couple of times women with their own kids would pee share with me so I'd take their boys in and she'd take the girls. Thank you to any mum who does that as constantly thinking that others thinking I was a pedophile isn't nice. The girls would make new friends and we'd meet up with them occasionally. It gets better as they get older until they hit 14, at which point you sit there alone wondering what there'll you should do, cos tiktok has taken over their lives. Embrace the parts you love, try to think of things like going to the park. But at that age there is a lot of killing time. Also I did find barbie dvds soul destroying after seeing them daily. I slowly got hold of old copies of programs from when I was growing up like bagpuss, rentaghost etc... and at the appropriate ages I'd but them on and we could start to enjoy them together.

I have a 6 and 3 year old and feel the same but when they were 1 and 3 (and it was the tail end of COVID) I felt very differently. With respect, all your plans for this weekend add up money wise. If you can spend every morning or afternoon at a nice farm park the time whizzes by but an afternoon at home can really drag.

This thread comes round every few months and it's the very notion that inspired all the MN puddlesuit jokes in lockdown - the idea that all you need to entertain a toddler is a puddlesuit. Someone once put timings next to a suggested schedule which was brilliant and showed all these wonderful ideas would actually fill 2 hours not 24 hours with a 1 year old. Baking or painting are not hour long activities at that age.

Cooking, cleaning and gardening that they 'help' with can be good. Also agree on National trust.

Look at holidays OP that always cheers me up 😂

You know it won’t last forever. Why are you feeling low?

I feel the same as you OP and I only have one child aged 20months. It’s worse now the holidays are on because not only do we have to find weekend activities but the normal things we do through the week when I’m not working are all cancelled throughout summer.
I try and do a lot with my child but at this age he has such a short attention span and restricted ability to do lots of things that people suggest.
For example we/I regularly take him to the park. He’s too small to climb on most of the equipment which all has big gaps/drop offs everywhere so it’s basically the swing and the slide (we’ve got about 6 parks near us and they’re all shit). Then he wants to spend his time escaping through the gate which turns into a tantrum. So there’s no way we can spend all morning at the park because I’ll be bored and stressed and so will he. Playdough - he eats. Paint - so much mess for 20 minutes before he’s lost interest.

We do all this stuff but it’s exhausting and boring. I’m just saying I feel you, that’s all.

I think @Rainbowsponge has it right - there's no need to suddenly spend your weekends bored to tears in front of cartoons just because you have children.

Yes, there are some restrictions and changes because of naps and nappies, but children don't need a full day of activities and plans that specifically cater to them.

I remember growing up in the nineties and just doing what my parents did - that could have been popping into their work, going for a walk, running errands, doing the food shop - yes, we might stop to play in the park or go for a bike ride but honestly it was mostly just tagging along with what they wanted or needed to do.

The big days out (farm and castle) you describe would have been once a summer kind of activities, not something you did in three days.

The key to me is planning the weekend into manageable chunks and having at least one thing to look forward to...

Definitely give each other some time to yourselves by taking it in turns to have both children. Be it one person being downstairs for an hour while the other lies in, or one of you visiting family if you have any with both kids etc.

Plan your favourite takeaway (or fakeaway) for the evening once they're in bed/saving your favourite show to watch.

If the little one still naps then that is the time to get the 3 year old entertaining themselves and youll have a minor break.

Agree with a pp about podcasts.

I really don't think people are being realistic about a 1 year old entertaining themselves! But I do agree with a pp that ideally it's good to carry on with adult things and drag them with you. Full disclosure that I only have 1, but I used to run errands in town and take him with me...with a trip to the coffee shop for me and a little treat for them incorporated. I actually have fond memories of this.

I have definitely had times when I found parenting mindnumbing and I'm glad I've not been a SAHP. You have my sympathies and it really will get better. I love weekends with my 10 year old now...and have for many years...but still follow the principles above.