The first week in and we are feeling a little wobbly over here. The kindergartner is perhaps the most surprised by the upheaval of his beautiful world. We went from lazy days to 6:00 alarm clocks. From playing all day with his legos and his siblings to arriving in class to the same spot day after day next to the same kids with the same people who are decidedly NOT his loved ones. From random trips to Barton Springs at 9pm to being in bed, lights out by 8:pm at the latest.

On the home front we are enjoying the first time in nearly 15 years that we are home alone during the day without any children, but still, this schedule is going to take some getting used to. I am a night owl by nature and the idea of being in bed by 11 is positively shocking to my system.

So here’s what we’ve figured out thus far about the things we need to make this all work, for everyone involved…

•  better lunch making routines – so that we’re not scrambling at bedtime to get lunches made for the next day. Or even worse, making lunches while we’re putting breakfast on the table. Whoever makes dinner will have one of the kids by them making lunches.
• Get our 6th grader on a different bike – it’s kind of hard to ride the bmx bike with a trumpet in tow. Especially if he also wants to bring his skateboard.
• Earlier dinner time. We’re still in our summer time mode of 7pm dinner time which is just too late if you need to be in bed by 8.
• Get a maid. Just kidding. But it sure would be fun to have a full-time maid on hand to clean up , do some laundry, maybe throw a meal together every now and again.
• Don’t hit the snooze on the alarm. It doesn’t really give me what I need, it just makes it more frantic getting everyone settled.
• Pause, for just 2 minutes, on the edge of the bed before I jump into high gear. That’s one thing I’ve been doing that is really, really working.
• Oh, and if you sense your young child might have a rough morning, do not wear a skirt with an elastic waistband.

I’d love to know how others are doing these first weeks of school. What have you learned about your family’s routine?

Though the temperatures here in Austin hover in the high 90s and the calendar still shows a few more weeks of summer remaining, it sort of feels like fall around here. Since school started up nearly 2 weeks ago, the shift into new regimens and routines and rituals has begun.

It’s been sometimes easy and sometimes hard in our house. Two kids that are going to school like their teachers. That’s easy. One that is homeschooling likes her schedule. That’s easy too. The wee one wonders where the kids are going every day and he misses them. That’s hard. Bedtime comes at the time when just 2 weeks ago we were heading to the cold springs for an evening dip. That’s hard to give up. But easy to fall asleep when the day has begun so early. And speaking of the day beginning so early, well, that’ hard and doesn’t really seem to ever get easier. No matter how long we do it. If we had our way, school would begin at 8:45. That would feel natural. But 7:45 never. So that’s hard. We’re biking to school everyday which came about because the van was in the shop. That seemed hard to be without.  But now we;re biking everyday because we like it. It feels easy. Way easier than trying to navigate the sea of anxious cars trying to beat the bell in the morning. And as the days pass, each day we remember something we knew last school year but forgot over the summer. Some are easy. Some are hard. Some we get used to. Some we don’t.

But the thing that keeps us going, the thing that keeps us from feeling out of control, the thing that keeps us connected or at least brings us back to connection when we might otherwise have lost it or when we actually DO lose it, is one simple question: Is this working for us? We’re asking it on many levels right now. And though we don’t have the completely clear answers, just asking the question is the very beginning of bringing us to where we want and need to be.

So, as you return to school schedules or job shifts or money issues or playdates or  parties or chore charts or bedtime schedules or whatever stuff is a part of your family life, ask yourself that one question: Is this working for us? It’ll help get you where you want to be. Seriously.