NOW CLOSED: Tell Weetabix about breakfast in your house - you could win a £100 Sainsbury's voucher

[NewGirlHelenMumsnet]

Weetabix would like you to share your top tips for making breakfast time as stress free as possible. What are your top breakfast tips? Can you share your best breakfast stories with them on this thread? For example, do you run round trying to eat and feed the baby at the same time or is it a calm, relaxed affair in your house?

The best tips and stories will feature on their new page on Mumsnet (coming soon).

Everyone who shares a story or tip on this thread will be entered into a prize draw where one lucky winner will receive a £100 Sainsbury's voucher, from Weetabix.

Thanks MNHQ

Our cereal cupboard is a bit ying and yang. In the blue corner is porridge, shreddies, branflakes and weetabix. In the red corner (currently) is a box of imported Lucky Charms. They are so sweet they make your teeth hurt.

DS 3.5 is always up half and hour before DD 5.5. So he watches Thomas or something whilst i make his porridge. He would eat that every day if I let him. He has it with a teaspoon of jam and raisins.

DD usually arrives just as I'm dishing up for DS and so I'll sit them both down together at the table to eat. The TV goes off, they have a cup of juice and I sit with them with a cup of tea and we have a nice chat and I make sure DS doesn't run off after two spoonfuls. They are normally in quite a good mood for brekka, and I find it amusing that they look like they have been roaming through the pine forests of Scandanavia all night, with their hair all stuck out at random angles and odd creases across their chubby cheeks.

I don't really find this part of the day stressful at all. They are always eating something that they really, really like so there is never, ever a face pull or a complaint of "I don't like it". For that reason alone it HAS to be my favourite meal of the day. If I've got out of bed on the right side, I will normally make some kind of face with the jam and raisins for DS. DD likes me to write her name on her weetabix with squeezy honey (no, she has not got a supercalifragalistic-like epic long name). I amuse myself when I do this. I watch what I am doing via my ironic third eye.

I always make DH a cup of tea and leave it waiting for him until he arrives downstairs. We have two mugs from the same range. His says DADDY COOL and mine says WHATEVER. It amuses me to put them next to each other in this order.

DH is normally showering and getting dressed whilst all this goes on, and when he arrives downstairs he tags me out and empties dishwasher, makes sure DC's finish up their breakfast, drinks his tea, grabs a slice of toast, puts coffee on then hustles the DC's upstairs and into clothes, bring me up a cup of coffee. See how we do the exchange of hot, caffeinated beverages of a morning? Tea for thirst, coffee to pin open eyes.

Then he gets the DC's through the bathroom: Teeth brush, face wash, hairbrush, and off we go!

I never eat breakfast until I'm at work. I'm too busy gazing into my DC's adorable faces to bother with it first thing. And whatever is in my cupboard at home can very rarely compare to the pleasure of a latte and a croissant munched in peace over my keyboard. It's a silent ritual, after which I bang the gong inside my brain and commence my travail.

Weekend breakfasts are a family affair. Saturday I may give it a bit of Nigella and cook up a stack of American Style pancakes which we all sit down together to eat. Sunday DH will do everyone a boiled egg and soldiers. I take mine in bed. Like Mrs Large, desperately trying to carve out her 5 Minutes Peace.

I am not a morning person.

Sometime between 710 and 740 DS (aged 4.10)will come into our room, sit on our bed and chatter away. DH answers, i hide under the duvet after the first good morning cuddle. DH and DS eventually go downstairs, DH makes DS his warm milk to drink and starts making the porridge. When its nearly ready, DH sends DS to yell "Mummeeeeee, paaaaawwwridge" at top volume up the stairs. I stagger downstairs, pour 2 mugs of half apple juice/half hot water and slug them to rehydrate/raise my blood sugar. I may make one for DH if feeling kind. Once DS has finished his milk, he will decide if he is joining us with porridge (not often) or having Weetabix, cheerios or shreddies (most days) for his breakfast. He gets this in a bowl dry, as he hates milk on stuff. He gets about 20 minutes of TV time while eating (very slowly) usually Octonauts on iplayer as the episodes are easy to time. After porridge, DH goes to shit/shower/shave and i rinse bowls and pot, check calendar on kitchen wall for the day, get DS clothes ready. When DH is done in the showerroom, i go for quick shower. When i am dried, and doing teeth, shout to DS to come upstairs and clean his teeth and (attempt to) get himself dressed. We usually wave at each other and have an indecipherable conversation as we both clean teeth. Amuses us. Say bye to DH who leaves about 8.40 for 15 minute walk to work. Depending how long the last bit of arguing that no he can't wear his batman socks they need washed, helping finding that day's must have toy to take, practising the jacket zipping and attempting to brush his stickyupyy hair (not popular) we will either leave at 9am to walk to preschool nursery or leave at 920 take the car and still be last in. I know we will need to improve rapidly in August when he starts school (Scotland) hey ho.

Tip: always rinse bowls immediately or you will return after the run to cereal as hard as diamond chips that cannot be removed except with industrial hardware and the elbow power of a Las Vegas fluffer.

Get everything ready the night before. Make sure uniforms (including socks/tights and undies are out). Put the bowls out night before. Have a large strong coffee before the kids get up - usually helps me to wake up first!!

It is unlikely to impress a cereal manufacturer but breakfast has got so much easier in our house since I stopped trying to insist ds ate my idea of a breakfast and let him have what he prefers.

He eats a sandwich, cheese cubes, cucumber and raw carrot without any fuss at all.

My top tip is Radio 3 while eating breakfast. The DCs (and DH) protested for a couple of days but then they accepted it, and it does wonders for everyone's mood, especially mine. There is no morning so rubbish and chaotic that it won't be improved and calmed by a soothing announcer from Radio 3 moving you smoothly on from Bach to Elgar with the minimum of chat. It's the cultural equivalent of a bit of lipstick, it gives you the heartening illusion of elegance and control.

I try to get my daughter actively involved in making the breakfast even if it is cereal as i find she pays more attention and is more compliant with my requests if shes not stressed out or being told no she cant help to save time

Make sure you know what breakfast is going to be the night before, then you can make sure you have everything you need.

If possible, get the table laid before bed - then you all arrive at the breakfast table in time for the morning to start off together. Worry about the mess later!

I am so of those with those leisurely pre-school starts to the morning. I never had them with DS because I was working, and even on mat leave with DD, DS had to be at school, so still no leisurely mornings.

We are a family of definitely NOT morning people - so getting up early is not a realistic option - and we have to be out by 7:50am to make it to school.

I am resigned to being the one injecting a sense of urgency into mornings until such time as the DC are old enough for it to be their problem if they miss the bus to school - although speaking to a friend with a similar but older family, she hasn't seen any reduction in chaos/volume - the only change being that if she is not working until later then she can go back to bed once the chaos has left the house, rather than having to be up and dressed and driving someone somewhere .

My little brother was always an early waker, so Mum's top breakfast tip would be to teach them how to make their own breakfast as early as humanly possible.

To start with this means leaving out a measured amount of milk and cereal (just not together) and making sure they know how to switch on the TV to a suitable channel :)

Nursery/my work days - either I eat breakfast before waking ds up, or he gets up and I'll offer him some milk, juice, or a pot of dry cereal to keep him going until he gets to nursery for proper breakfast. Then I'll have cereal or porridge when I get to work.

Other days it's pretty stress-free as toddlers seem to be motivated by breakfast, so will agree to have new nappy etc, and then will eat it as no telly allowed until breakfast is eaten and clothes are on. Lunch, on the other hand, requires a lot of 'no, we don't eat cheerios/weetabix/shreddies/pancake for lunch' until something is eaten.

Cereal at nursery or toast at home those are our rules.

Much less mess too

DS1 makes breakfast for himself and dd.They normally have wheatabix with jam/honey/fruit sometimes they have toast. Meanwhile I bf ds2 and then grab a bowl of wheatabix myself.Then I chase dd round to get her dressed and leave for school.It`s always chaos and the weekend can never come round quick enough.

Does anyone do lots of different things with Weetabix? I have never been tempted to add yogurt of fruit or anything, just like them with milk and sugar!

Plan ahead, give everyone their own bowl and make sure they take responsibility for cleaning it etc

I set the table the night before. I think breakfast is just as important as any other meal and I think breakfast together at a nicely set table is a great way to start the day. We all get dressed beforehand and we spend the 20 minutes before we all go our separate ways sitting down together. It's usually something quick to prepare cold cereal, porridge or toast. Wheatabix is a favourite. The weekends are more relaxed and we usually have pancakes or muffins with bacon and sausages.

I set the table the night before. I think breakfast is just as important as any other meal and I think breakfast together at a nicely set table is a great way to start the day. We all get dressed beforehand and we spend the 20 minutes before we all go our separate ways sitting down together. It's usually something quick to prepare cold cereal, porridge or toast. Weetabix is a favourite. The weekends are more relaxed and we usually have pancakes or muffins with bacon and sausages.

During the week we all help ourselves to cereal, but at weekends we enjoy fresh rolls and coffee together (a habit picked up whilst living in Germany), after a bit of a lie in. If the younger children can't wait, they help themselves to some cereal first. Our teenage son buys the rolls on the way back from his paper round.

DD loves mini-weetabix it has to be said. I'm a porridge fan myself, but by the time I've sorted breakfast for the two little ones I can usually only be bothered to grab an apple or yoghurt before we leave the house. Cereal at bedtime on the other hand - started that habit at uni and can say categorically that breakfast is tastier at 11.30pm than at 8am!

Use the broken weetabixs and the powder at the bottom of the packet and put into a bowl with banana and milk and mash with a fork.

You can call it 'squashy banana mess' as we do!

In summer we eat breakfast in the garden, so we all get the benefit of the fresh air, makes the food taste even nicer and gently wakes up tired parents.

We offer a choice of three cereals...currently offering mock coco pops from Asda, mock Crunchy Nut Cornflakes from Aldi and mock Weetabix from Poundland. Giving them a limited choice means breakfast is the only meal of the day which everyone eats without complaint.

Under 2 years old children have dry cereal only, as it saves mess, no spoons needed and cereal is still edible an hour later when the toddler is finally ready to finish eating.

I always give a '5 minute warning' before we need to be finished eating And out of the front door, so the children have fair warning to stop messing around and eat if they are hungry.

Weekdays - put cbeebies on. Immediate silence and eating.

Weekends - make pancakes, noodle round, eat lots and slowly all together

We eat together in the morning, I just make sure I allow enough time for lunch prep, breakfast prep and getting ready, (I sound more organised than I am, but somehow I manage it). I think if you just know that you have to get up early enough to get it all ready you just do it. I try to do easy breakfast in the week, cereal, porridge or toast and then at the weekends we have eggs, bacon, mushrooms and tomatoes. On birthdays the birthday person gets to choose breakfast :-)