If your’e like me, your’e always looking for the best way to help your family feel calmer and more in control during these COVID19 lockdowns. I’m here to help you do just that. In the next few minutes I’m going to give you this one brilliant thing that helped me create a calm and mindful environment. It’s just a few steps that anyone can do straight away. Get your cuppa and enjoy.
When all the days roll into one, your active wear becomes your day wear and your pyjamas become your anytime of the day or night wear. So how do we start to make one day feel different from the next. Cornflakes is dinner and tuna sandwiches are breakfast and pizza or that 3 day old casserole is just a free for all. If you’re in a lockdown muddle like me then I’m sure you feel much the same. In this new era where our social norms once defined our schedules and our attire, we’ve had to set a new standard all together. The half suit (literally top half required for zoom meetings only). The deckfast (where you’ve realised all day that you forgot to feed the kids and now it’s 5pm and you have to give them breakfast and dinner rolled into one #sidenote – I hope it doesn’t go unnoticed that I was careful how I combined my words there). I’m sure there are many other lockdown combos you’ve discovered and I would love to hear them in the comments below.
Either way our social punctuation so to speak no longer exists and that is why it is imperative that we start to create it for ourselves. Routine is a dirty word for me, much like organising, putting things in the right place and anything else an adult with ADHD trying to teach on Zoom and look after 3 kids under 6 in an apartment with no balcony or garden during a worldwide pandemic, might struggle with. Yet I’ve found that doing the very thing that I though might crush my creative spirit is actually the very thing that lets it soar.
Actual Footage of myself trying to use my shoes as phones after going from family self isolation into National lockdown due to COVID19 infections.
Routine. There I said it without twitching. A good lockdown routine is what can give you the punctuation to create a more calm, fun, exciting and all round enjoyable experience. While you may feel that lockdown is difficult, believe me your little ones (or big) are taking it even harder. Suddenly everything they’ve known has changed. The reliability of school and social interactions as been taken from them and it can easily leave a feeling on insecurity and anxiety in its place. I really do compare it to punctuation. Punctuation can change meaning, create meaning and really defines exactly what it is you are trying to say. It gives the reader confidence and most importantly it’s trustworthy. We want to create all of these feelings in ourselves and our family during lockdown.
” ! . ); So here’s how you can create your lockdown punctuation. ” ! . );
Start and end the day the same way. Make sure you keep your mornings as regular as possible. Wake up, wash your face, get dressed. My daughter loves being in her pyjamas. Literally when she has playdates they come home and they all get into her pyjamas. That’s fine, but everyday I make her change from night pyjamas into day pyjamas. There needs to be some sort of defining (and nice smelling) moment where you shift from sleep mode into day mode.
Start and end your day the same way.
Mrs. G
Set yourself a schedule. It can be as detailed or as lax as you want but set yourself some milestones. Whether it’s afternoon yoga or a dance party before lunch, create the same point every day where you pull it all in together. Then of course feel free to let it go absolutely wild again. I’ve found that during lockdown after bath and bedtime I just don’t have the energy to read to my kids. I shifted our story time to the afternoon or sometimes evening early evening. I have more energy for it so I’m less resentful on the fourth book, the kids are actually more engaged because they’re not trying to fall asleep… see everyone’s happy!
Now YOU! Make sure that you get dressed everyday. I’m not giving you the day pyjama pass. I want you to actually get dressed. If you get out to the park I want those fancy pants and button down shirt baby. If it’s active wear, make it your best active wear but also some days just put on nice jeans and comfy sweater. DO YOUR MAKEUP. I’m a tinted moisturiser and mascara kinda girl. Whatever your level is, do it. It FEELS good! Do it for you because you need to feel one day from the next. You need to know that today is a NEW day. I even put lip gloss under my mask when I go out. I genuinely like the way lipgloss feels and who cares if no-one sees it. I FEEL it.
Now for the full stop, exclamation mark, #theend. Each day should start and end in the same way. I’m not going to lie. I’m typing in my daughters room right now in the dark trying to convince her to fall asleep at 10pm at night. What I would like to be doing is relaxing with the hubby… eating a soy chocolate yogurt and watching Bridgeton. I will stick it out because if I persevere tonight, tomorrow night (or next week sometime)… it will get easier. I believe she will be able to relax and get that ticket to dreamland at least by 8:30 (partay). It’s definitely the 5 year regression. Jokes aside, sticking to the night time routine is hardest in these times because really all the days roll into one… however we need to keep in mind that the end of one day is really the beginning of the next.
Very much a recreation of how I often fail this step but constantly promise myself from tomorrow i’ll do better… I feel the difference when I can make it work!
The end of one day is really the beginning of the next
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I’ve set up this ‘routine’ that we aim to meet every day. Are we perfect, far from it. Have I spent all day in pyjamas before… definitely. Have I given a different combination of carbs and cheese as meals for all three meals in one day (you’d be surprised how many combos you can come up with; crackers and cheese, pizza, toasted cheese sandwich, cheese in a cup…)… YES.
I’m not a robot… I’m just a mum.
That being said most days I do aim to follow most of this routine and I hope you can too because I genuinely believe that we all need routine and predictability in our life in order to create a foundation so that our creative juices can soar. When we are relaxed and know what to expect we leave space to enjoy, breathe and be calm through this crazy crazy experience.
If anyone is feeling overwhelmed in lockdown or you need some inspiration for ideas or setting up a routine please feel free to reach out.
Yours Truly,
Mrs. G
Xoxo
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