Looking after the Referrals and Affiliates channels here at Symprove means you can guarantee I can talk about gut health to anyone and everyone. In fact, so much so that both my children and husband could chat poo and bacteria at any given moment, which with a 6-year-old can lead to some funny stories.
As a full-time working parent to two lively girls, married to a busy tradesman, and a houseful of pets, mornings at our home can be described as somewhat chaotic. For us as a family this means preparation is key. Anything we can get done ahead of time we try our best to do. We each take responsibility for helping each other and making sure that the ship runs – definitely not always smoothly but always avoiding capsizing.
Our morning routine is pretty consistent and has been since our 9-year-old started school. Here are some of the key moments in our mornings that we find help us all get out the door, mostly dressed, and mostly on time as a gut-healthy family.
Our 5 morning non-negotiables as a gut-immune focussed family
1. The night before…
Our mornings start at 7pm the night before. Uniform is laid out, bags, coats and shoes are by the front door and lunches are packed. These three jobs mean a lot more time and energy for the morning itself. It also saves any last-minute panic about if it’s a PE day or not or if someone’s lost a shoe.
2. 5 minutes before the day begins…
The alarms go off and myself and my husband are up and dressed before waking the kids. He will fetch our little one and I will wake our almost 10-year-old (it can be a dangerous thing to do) and we all pile into our bed, cuddly toys too! We take 5 minutes for the kids to wake up slowly and for us to have a moment with them.
3. It’s a family thing… We all shot our Symprove together
Once everyone is dressed and awake, we head downstairs and gather round the kitchen side like some sort of odd ritual- anyone looking through the window might question our morning activity! I’ll grab the Symprove from the fridge, Nick will grab the glasses and four shots are poured. In unison we all take our shots of the good gut bugs- often to shouts of cheers. Those few moments of taking Symprove together are an anchor to the rest of the morning and a real game changer for us as a family - we have all felt the benefit in different ways since becoming a Symprove family over 4 years ago.
4. Ponytails, guinea pigs and Ralph…
Whilst waiting for our Symprove shots to go down we all break away and make sure the house, ourselves and the pets are all set up for the day. Emily and Nick will feed her Guinea pigs and Ralph the dog (we all try to get outside for a few minutes of daylight!) whilst me and Freya get started on her hairstyle of the day. Having everyone responsible for a small part of the morning really helps us all stay on track and ticking everything off the list.
5. Breakfast, teeth and time to go...
After 10 minutes of jobs and rushing we make sure we have time to sit down and eat breakfast. The kids have really got into helping chop up fruit to add to their breakfast of choice. Then back upstairs for a final teeth brush, before we all bundle out the door.
For us it's all about the little habits and routines we can rely on to make that chaotic family morning a little bit easier and a lot more enjoyable.
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