Monday Morning Chaos

So on the rare occasion that Dave has to work - it's usually on Mondays.  He is a trained surgical technician and works at a surgery center 1-2 days a week (if they need him).  When he does work, he normally has to be there around 7am.  This poses an interesting transportation challenge for us.  Kaleb and Gabe attend District 20 schools about 25 minutes away, Brian attends a District 49 school about 10 min away, and Xander and Elijah don't go to school at all yet.  We are very blessed to live in the same city as Dave's Mom, Dad and Sister.  They have been an enormous help to us through the years.  Particularly, on days that Dave has to work - they are a blessing from God.  Mondays normally go like this:

5am - Everyone wakes up
5:30 - Mom leave for PT
5:45 - Dad takes Elijah, Gabe, Xander and Kaleb to Grammy and Grampy's house
6:00 - Dad heads to work, mom does PT for an hour
7:15 - Mom gets home and wakes Brian up
7:15 - Grammy drives Kaleb to school
7:50 - Mom drives Brian to school
8:15- Grammy drives Gabe to school
8:45 - Mom heads to work
2:15 - Grammy picks up Kaleb; Kaleb does homework
3:15 - Grammy picks up Gabe
4:00 - Brian gets home from school and does homework
4:00 - Dad picks up Kaleb, Gabe, Elijah, and Xander from Grammy's
5:10 - Mom gets home
5:15 - Family Dinner time
5:45 - Mom or Dad take Brian and Gabe to Kempo Karate
6:15-7:15 - Kempo Karate
7:30 - Elijah's bedtime feeding
7:45 - Gabe and Brian home; all the boys make their lunches
8:00 - Older boys showers
8:15 - Gabe and Xander Bedtime Routine
8:30 - Brian bedtime
9:00 - Kaleb bedtime
And then Mom and Dad finally relax

A lot of people ask me "How do you do it with 5 boys?  I can't imagine!"   I like to think it's pretty easy- but probably because I don't remember it being any less chaotic.  I likely would not know what to do with myself  if our lives weren't busy.  But, I will say this, our family would not function if it weren't for a schedule and routine.  Any families that have discipline issues with their kids, or find themselves not having enough time in the day to accomplish things, should take a look at their family schedule.  Ours isn't written down, because we've memorized it- but it does help to have a large, desktop size calendar to plan out events.  We've utilized that in the past.  We hang it on the wall, write down the kids' various activities and then highlight those events.  Each kiddo had their own color.  We would also write our daily dinner meals on it so the kids would know in advance what was for dinner. Our kids know when homework gets done, when meals are eaten, when bedtime is, and when TV/Games are allowed.  We rarely deviate much from our schedule.   Kids thrive for consistency and rules.  I never really believed this until I saw how much better behaved our kids were when they knew what to expect.