The days at home with my kids are rewarding but also long. As we enter this new year, I wanted to document our schedule. Hopefully, this could help anyone trying to deal with two kids of similar ages to mine. So, I present my daily routine as a stay-at-home parent.
Here’s what it’s like for me as a Stay-at-Home dad with a three-year-old and an eight-month-old.
Me-Time
One thing I found surprising when I became a stay-at-home parent was how little time I had to myself. Since I’ve been home, I’ve started to wake up as early or earlier than when I went to work. When I started staying home, I would wake up at 5:00 AM, work out for thirty minutes, and shower.
Since we got hit with stomach bugs and sleep regressions, it has gotten closer to 6 AM. After all the wake-ups during the night, I need all the sleep I can get.
Once I wake up, I make coffee and go through my websites for news from the night before. With that accomplished, I set a twelve-minute timer and read a book.
Reading helps me escape. I would love to dedicate more time to reading, but I have limited time. Don’t forget, I’m an indie author right now, too. Try my book Letty Rose and the Mistaken Identity here.
Once I’ve put my book away, and if no one has woken up, I turn my attention to whatever writing I’m doing for the day. Most of my writing attention goes to my in-progress novel and less to my blog. I am trying to write more blog posts, but I’m also forty thousand words into my novel and enjoying the characters so much I can’t steal myself away from them.
I try to write at least six hundred words before the family wakes up. Some days, I get way more; some days, someone wakes up as soon as I’m done reading. If I don’t get my word count, I feel it in my bones for the rest of the day until I can write again.
The Awakening and Breakfast
Both of our kids awaken around seven in the morning.
Since our oldest has turned three, we have moved him into a transition crib. He can now get into and out of his bed when he wants. I also installed a color LED smart bulb in his room. I have an automation set that turns the bulb red at bedtime and green at wake-up time. We are training him that red means bed and green means go. For the most part, it works.
Once it is time to go, I head to his room to greet him for the morning. I try to direct him to the bathroom, which takes longer than it should.
We head back to his room to pick out clothes for the day. He’ll pick a shirt, and then I give him options for shorts or pants. He does better in the morning if he has some choice in his clothing instead of me forcing things on him.
Then we head down to play in the playroom until mom and brother are ready. Once they come out, I take breakfast orders and prepare things for everyone. It can feel like I’m a short-order cook.
When the food is ready, I try to get the oldest fed while I eat before I attempt to feed the infant. On school days, mom will take the oldest to school. On the other days, my toddler will usually watch Bluey—a great kids’ show that has taught me things about parenting— while I finish feeding the baby.
Once the baby finishes, I tried to get them to play with me before nap time. The older one often picks up on the play and leaves whatever screen he’s watching to join. Then, I try to entertain both kids with toys from our playroom until it’s time for the first nap.
The First Nap
My youngest is stubborn. He will play as much as possible without showing any signs of being tired. So, I have him on a nap schedule, which I know is a hot debate.
When it’s about time for him to sleep, I keep a close eye on him to see if he is giving any sleep signs, but more often than not, he doesn’t until I pick him up and walk around. I sing and put him in his sleep sack when it’s time. If he starts to get cranky or fight me, I’ll still get him in his sleep sack, but then I’ll take him to the playroom for a few minutes.
Most of the time, though, he lets me rock him while he works up a couple of yawns. Once I can tell he is sleepy, I put him down in his crib in the closet. We have him here for now because it is dark and quiet and dampens most of the sounds from the rest of the house. I used to rock him to sleep because he would scream like a banshee as we got ready for sleep. After Christmas, though, he changed. He wanted to be a contact sleeper at my parents’ house, but upon returning home, he didn’t like me to rock him that long anymore.
After putting him down, I try to clean the kitchen while he tries to sleep. We have reached the point where he will finally fall asleep within a couple of minutes of being put down.
Playtime and Lunch
Once the baby falls asleep, it’s time to focus on something else. Usually, if the oldest is home, I let him watch videos or play on his tablet for thirty minutes or so while I write. After those thirty minutes, a battle to get off the screen ensues, but then we play pretty hard with toys or run around chasing each other.
If the toddler is at school, I get an hour and a half to two hours to myself. Laundry, bills, writing, and research all happen in this one block of me-time. However, after the holidays, I feel like I should take a moment to watch a show or something.
When the baby wakes up, it’s time to eat. I’ll let the oldest watch TV while we work on the bottle.
If the weather is nice, I like to walk around the neighborhood, no matter how many kids I have. The oldest doesn’t always want to go, but he’ll come if he has some toys.
Then we tackle lunch, which again turns into me being a line cook. Once we’re all done with food, I shuffle everyone around to play again. If the weather is good, I’ll try to get us to a park or somewhere. Since we’re trapped inside with the baby so much, it’s nice to get out to play somewhere different.
After another hour or so, it’s time for the baby to get another bottle and start winding down for his next nap.
The Long Afternoon
The next nap is usually the hardest of the day. We follow the same practice to get him to sleep, usually with him crying himself to sleep.
If it’s a school day, I must pick up the oldest during this time. Luckily, the nap time has lined up perfectly for pickup, or if it hasn’t, the kids’ grandmother has come to watch the baby while I go.
Once we’re back from school, we either rest or continue playing. With Grandma there, I get to entertain the big boy by myself. I try to include things like building with blocks, magnet tiles, or coloring. Most of the time, though, we play Super Heroes.
With Super Heroes, we run around the house chasing each other and shouting out our superpowers. It’s one of his favorites, but it exhausts me since I have to do most of the work. Still, I wouldn’t trade it for anything except maybe a day off from parenting.
The entire afternoon, I’m counting down the minutes until Mom gets home to help take a little load off of me.
Dinner, Lessons, and Playtime
Whether mom has made it home or not, I start cooking dinner around 4:30. I do whatever I can to get my toddler to let me cook. Usually, that means getting him a snack and turning on the TV, although sometimes, he wants to help me cook. I’ll pull up our little platform and give him a task. It’s cute, and I love it.
A couple of nights a week, I give tennis lessons. So I’m usually anxious, waiting for my wife to take over watching the kids so I can go. It is nice to get away from everything for an hour.
My lessons aren’t much, but they offer me a chance to leave the house and not be an active parent for a while. It also brings in some money, so I don’t feel completely dependent on my wife’s income.
After dinner, we try to get the boys to play to wind down the night. This isn’t always the easiest, and I’m exhausted and easy to irritate, but I like watching them play.
Bedtime and Beyond
Bedtime is my least favorite time of the day. I’m usually so drained from the entire day that I want the kids to sleep so I can recover. But like most toddlers, mine doesn’t handle the transition from play to rest very well.
We have had some of the worst meltdowns during this time.
I try to stay as calm and firm as possible. Still, there were times I got him in the bath by forcing him, and I didn’t like myself afterward.
After he turned three, things got much easier. He still protests but doesn’t melt down as severely. He still had to be coerced to take a bath.
After the bath, we brush our teeth and head to his room to try to play one last game of the day. Sometimes, it’s acting like we’re untied balloons; sometimes, it’s Super Heroes. Lately, we’ve added in things like blanket swings.
While I’m handling the big one, my wife takes the little one. When she is done, she’ll help me. We get him settled down enough to read two books. Then we turn his light red and get him in bed. We lay on the floor while he lays in his. We try to get him asleep before we slip out of his room.
Since the New Year started, once we’re done with the kids’ bedtime, we’ll clean the kitchen or take out the trash, whatever needs to be done, and then we’ll try to get a workout in. Finally, we wind down with showers and TV as I mentally try to prepare myself for the next day.
Plans for the Daily Routine in the Future
My schedule isn’t perfect. I could probably prepare some things for the kids to do the night before, but I’m so exhausted by the end of the day that I need time to just be. I could also rotate out toys, but I would need to be on my game about prep work. I want to work on that and see how it does.
I want to work on structured independent play for the oldest. I’m considering offering one minute of tablet time for one minute of independent play. Of course, as much as I want time to do things for myself during the day, I also don’t want to lose the connection with my son. Still, it would be amazing if he could play by himself a little more during the day.
And, of course, things will change as the boys grow. But that’s what we do. We roll with it.
For those of you who stay home, what is your schedule like? Let me know on Threads. Do you have some tips or tricks that help you out?
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