Regimenting the school morning

[Crapuccino]

I need recommendations for ways to regiment the school morning. Currently, my morning is that I make breakfast for everyone, then feed me and the DTs (8mo), clean them up, tidy the mess up, change the babies, and settle them for their first nap. Meanwhile DH helps the 4yo with his breakfast, gets him dressed/brushed/combed, packs his stuff, and takes him to nursery. In reality, however, DH floats along, picks at his face for a bit, floats along, checks what the Aldi special buys are this week, flooaaats alooo- HOLY SHIT IS THAT THE TIME WHY AREN’T YOU DRESSED STOP MESSING ABOUT GET YOUR SHOES ON etc. etc. You get the picture.

Before the DTs the schoolrun was my job and I regimented it like a machine - two hours from getting up to getting into the classroom, so that there was a decent amount of time for everything, there were no last minute panics, nothing got forgotten (well, at least not due to rushing), and we all made it there with no rushing-related tears. Since DH took over though it’s gone tits-up and even with two hours to get ready every morning - IF he gets the 4yo up on time, which now rarely happens - it invariably dissolves into a shouty mess that results in them still getting there late. Sometimes really late. It’s actually impressive how DH can faff so much time away and be so continually amazed that time has run out on him yet again. I used to play the drill sargeant, shouting from different parts of the house, “Is he dressed yet? Have you done his teeth yet?” but finally got sick of that lark and left them to it in the hopes that they’d figure it out themselves. The net result, several months later, is that we’ve probably thrown away hundreds of pounds in wasted nursery fees through DS consistently getting in at least an hour late every day, and though he starts school proper in September, we are no closer to him and DH having a functioning morning routine.

Aaaaaanyway, boring context aside, does anyone have The Answer? A system? A method? A fucking outright miracle?? DS responds very well to timers for starting and stopping tasks, and DH could be made to follow one if all he had to do was obey it, but I’d need something simpler than setting the oven timer for every task otherwise that wouldn’t get done. I’d need it to just kick it at 06:30 and run itself. Has anyone got some sort of alert system on their phones or a god on hand to fire down lightning bolts? I’ll take anything right now.

Sorry so long. Today was more frustrating than usual. I almost can’t wait till the DTs drop their daytime feeds so DH can take over them, float along at his own pace feeding and changing them, and I can do the bit that has an actual deadline.

cries into coffee

My DH was the same in terms of the faffing when he was around for a brief spell last year as he was made redundant and like you I played sargeanf major from a distance reminding him of everything which made me very stressed, he snapped at me but he had more faffing time (which helped nobody).
I think all you can do is type/write up a generic timetable for mornings with wake up times, breakfast, clean teeth, get dressed, don’t forget lunch, keys, etc etc etc leave at x time. Then leave them to it. Good luck. I find the more organised I am the less organised my DH feels he needs to be organised.

We've just started a star chart for DD which is working kinda

But the issue is with your DH, not DS.... he's only 4 remember.

We use the 'boing boing' on our iPhones to do timers - right DD, boing boing to get up. Clothes chosen the night before and she hangs them on radiator so they're cosy.

Then it's a 'quick, get into your clothes when they're warm'

And getting ready is a BIG sticker on the star chart. We agree ahead of time what her treat will be if she gets x stickers.

e.g. a £5 toy from Tesco/magazine/ice cream in the cafe.

i feel you pain mind you. Having a race also works sometimes.

I posted on this exact issue a while ago and so many people were saying "FFS she's 3, make her" but it's not as easy as that.

I do what your DH does and bumble along bumbling DS along until I wind up into top gear 2 mins before we need to leave the house and then it's PANIC PANIC PANIC, WE'RE LATE, HURRY UP, WHAT'RE YOU DOING!!!!!!! We constantly chat about this but my 3 yr old (nearly 4) is strangely not capable of kicking it up a gear at the last possible second. Am somewhat ashamed.

No personal experience but I've seen someone colour code a cheap clock with each 5-10 min slot a different colour for a different activity. Helps show up when not on track.

Otherwise borrow DH's phone and add recurring alerts, with 10 mins at the end for play if all done, or extra faff if not.

I get DS up at 6.40am and out the door at 7.15am. DH commented that it's like a military operation. The answer to your qunadry is to get your DH out of the way, frankly. My DH leaves for work at 6am on the days I do the school drop off (to breakfast club); on his days to drop off they seem to spend 90 minutes faffing around at home. DH has only recently realised that having the TV on in the morning is a hinderance.

We have a new baby arriving this summer, so I have much respect for you with a school run and twins, but I'd say a) tell your DH to just go and get himself ready, b) put everything out the night before (uniform, cereal etc.), c) instigate dressing races to see if your older DC can be ready in the time it takes for you to dress yourself / two babies, d) stick paste on toothbrushes before you go downstairs, e) break the morning down into chunks - I know we'll be late if we aren't dressed by 6.50 and haven't eaten by 7.05 so we stop at that point, or I explain to DS he will be going to school in his PJs if he doesn't get them on in the next 90 seconds as we're about to run out of time to do so.

It sounds mad, but it gives you an idea of where you are now in terms of getting everybody out by x time. We had one ocasion where DS put his socks on in the car but we've never had to dress in the car this far so it seems to be working.

Thanks all. I’m starting to think that even with the DTs to sort out, it’ll be easier if I do the whole school run prep and just fire DH and DS out of the door at the appropriate time. In most other respects DH aid superb. He’ll be the SAHP when I go back to work and he’s superbly well-suited to it, but in this one respect he’s just infuriatingly useless.