The First Week Back 

Day One

You wake up feeling ready to take on the world with an upbeat dance song playing on a loop in your head. All of the clothes and uniforms were all laid out ready the night before for each child, down to the underwear, and you have even remembered to do all the buttons up for the boy who can’t (won’t) do buttons. You laugh in the face of time as you wake early enough to get everything done three times before it is time to leave. Cup of tea number three is excessive, but you enjoy it.  You take your time to gently wake each sleeping child with a kiss, cuddle and promise that they can a have just a few more minutes, but keen to return to the world of education, they all follow you down the stairs, happy to be back in the routine of things.  Everyone is dressed with time to spare and you only have to ask them once what they would like for breakfast. the breakfast table is laid ready for the early morning eating onslaught and Dad even had time to leave everyone a nice little note wishing them a happy day.  You’ve got this parenting in a morning thing nailed.  Nothing is going to get in your way. Shoes are gleaming, children are sparkling and you all arrive at your destination early and with a smile on your faces.

Day Two

Your find parting with your bed a little more of a challenge and wish for the hundredth time that you had a teas maid to help you on your way each day.  The song in your head is a little slower this morning.  Uniform is laid out ready and you’re on cup of tea number two when you realise that you need to get moving.  The children are a little reluctant to give up their beds and you cajole them a little more forcibly to get up and get ready.  The boy who doesn’t do buttons complains as his buttons are not done up for him and the small person with lots of hair looks like it might take a small miracle to get her hair to resemble something tidy. Dressing takes longer and all children have to be nagged into brushing their teeth.  The breakfast table is laid very rapidly before the arrival of the children, no notes, not time and there is a little more tension as we leave bang on time with no minutes to spare.  Shoes look awful but there is no time to do anything about it. We are still smiling just but we are all a little less sparkly. Still hanging on to the morning parenting award, but only just.

Day Three

It can’t be time to get up, it is the middle of the night.  Just a few more minutes. The duvet is too heavy, I can’t move it.  Caffeine, I need caffeine.  One cup of tea down and we are already late and no children are awake.  There is nothing gentle about this morning’s wake up call, it is a ‘get up now, we are late’ and a quick shake, followed by fifteen minutes of shouting up the stairs that they will be walking to school if they don’t get up now (which is seven miles, so that would be quite a walk). The song in my head this morning is more of a sweary chant at myself for not getting up earlier and not getting the uniform out the night before.  The children all slowly appear and sit quietly like stunned rabbits, clearly unaware of the state of national emergency going on around them.  My exercise for the day follows as I run around at top speed throwing clothes at children, running brushes through their hair and pushing them into the bathroom.  My hair and makeup are more drag queen than usual but I don’t have time to worry about that. Speed eating is the order of the day for breakfast, no talking, no messing, just eat and go, people, eat and go. The boy who can’t do buttons decides that as I am on my way out of the door is a good time to tell me that he has lost one of his shoe laces.  Lost.  How does that even happen? Shoes are a disaster, must remember to sort after school. The sparkle has gone and morning mum of the year I am no more.

Day Four

Surely it is the weekend? Snooze.  Snooze again.  I can’t be late again, yesterday was awful.  Snooze.  Oh, my god, we are so late.  I need a shower. No time for tea.  Children are wrenched from under duvets and frogmarched downstairs.  Orders given and I take the world’s quickest shower to discover that my children have turned to statues.  They have quite literally not moved a muscle.  Panic sets in.  We are going to be late. The small one with unruly hair will just have to go to school with crazy hair today and the boy who can’t do buttons has to be physically slid into his uniform if there is any hope of getting out of the house. The tween decides to have a bad hair day and locks himself in the bathroom to try each of his twenty hair products to try and resolve his ’emergency’.  Meanwhile, I am organising a takeaway breakfast for everyone to eat in the car. Still no lace in one shoe, I salvage another lace from some trainers but they are ridiculously long and we have a debate about whether a long lace or no lace at all is the way forward.  I make a mental note to buy the boys slip on shoes from now on. By some miracle, we end up in the car on time, we get halfway to school for one of the children to realise that they have left something extremely important at home and we need to go back.  They then ask me why I am swearing under my breath.  Sparkle, well and truly gone.

Day Five

Alarm is on snooze number five. Why am I so tired? Why isn’t it the weekend? You stay under the duvet until the last possible second. Why didn’t I get uniform out last night? In fact, is there enough uniform. Children will have to go in wearing unironed uniform today, it’s clean that is the main thing isn’t it? Children have to be cajoled, threatened and forcibly dragged out of bed. The small person with unruly hair claims to be ill, I fondly call in Fridaytireditis and reassure her that a bit of food and she will be fine.  The boy who can’t do buttons says he is not going to school simply because he is too tired.  The tween in on the slowest go slow ever.  Getting a choice of breakfast could be compared to extracting top secret information.  Is 7:30 am too early for Prosecco? Dad has left notes but we have no time to read them.  No time for tea and only just time for breakfast and that is like feeding time at the zoo with me throwing food at them before placing them in their now very dirty shoes and shoving them out of the door.  I am wearing no make-up at all and I notice that three of us are wearing odd socks. We all look grumpy, exhausted, unkempt and rather creased.  There is absolutely no sparkle left.

I so don’t have the parenting morning thing nailed.  Maybe it will be better next week?

How long until the next school holiday?