What age did you stop getting up with your kids in the morning for school?

[C.Ann]

Until gaduation.. As soon as the kids left for school, we had a group of 10 moms who started their day with a coffee klatch every morning.. We would rotate whose house we would all meet at each morning.. I miss those days..

 

[ckay87]

Ditto for me and my girls (except only one is in High School and the other is in Middle School). My mother did this for me also. It is hard being a teen and this is one small way I can baby them that they don't resent and actually appreciate.

Me too. I was starting to feel like a freak of a mother here. I know that this will cause some to blow a gasket, but I AM my sons' alarm clock (11th and 7th grades) I told my 16 year old that he should probably start using his own alarm clock and he said (in complete seriousness) "but I like the sound of your voice so much better." Awwww, come on, how can I say no to that? He needs me for almost nothing anymore other than a nagging out of bed. I can do that - I am up for work anyway. I'd rather not be up that flipping early (HS hours are like torture), but who cares.

 

[MUFFYCAT]

My 2 girls starting waking up on their in the 8th grade, maybe the end of the 7th.

 

[OK!]

My dad was always up getting ready for work at that time anyway, but my mom still got up with us every morning for school from preschool until we graduated. The only exceptions came when she was sick or when I had swim practice before school and therefore was getting up before 4:30 am.

 

[suejai]

When DSS was still in HS I would call down just to make sure he was awake. He was on the grumpy side in the morning and for a while I would think there was something wrong and would keep asking if he was okay, which of course annoyed him. Eventually I figured out that he is just not a morning person.

DS14 has his own alarm clock but he hits snooze so many times it becomes ridiculous. I get up to nag him out of bed, and to spend time so there is someone there to say goodbye to when he leaves. But he takes care of everything else.

When I worked I would drive him as far as the office, which is half way between home and school, and he would walk the rest of the way. Or, in the warmer weather, we would walk to work together. I had a two minute commute.

 

[clutter]

I told my 16 year old that he should probably start using his own alarm clock and he said (in complete seriousness) "but I like the sound of your voice so much better." Awwww, come on, how can I say no to that?

My dd12 pulled that one me, too! I told her I'd buy her one of the recordable alarm clocks.

In elementary school, I had a sitter come in and I was out the door before dd was awake. Since she's not much of a morning person, that was a blessing. Now in middle school, I need to leave about 15 minutes before her. (It worked the first few weeks, but not lately. Did I mention she's not a morning person?) Anyway, I'm up anyway, I never get to sleep in.

 

[*Fantasia*]

My two older kids are 12 (going on 13 in a few days) and 10. I wake up for them to make sure they eat breakfast and have everything they need before heading out the door. I have to wake anyways to drive my daughter to school. I'm sure I'd still get up in the morning with them even if they're in high school. I want to make sure that they are dressed properly and got their stuff together and I would have to drive them to school.

 

[stacy347]

I am up with my girls every morning. I get the 16 year old up first at 5:30 (we have yet to find an alarm that will wake that girl ~ and we've tried a LOT of them ).
Once she is up, I have my morning quiet time and the three older girls take turns getting ready. DD16 and DD15 get a ride to school with their friend down the street around 7:20. DD12 hops on the bus at 7:25 at which point I wake up DD11 and she and I both get ready (she starts school at 8:40 so I drop her off and head to work).

We were just informed that starting next week DD12's morning bus pickup will now be 7:10 which is going to throw a huge kink into our routine...soooo not looking forward to that.

 

[disykat]

Junior high for me. The kids and I are not morning people. If we are all up, we spend our morning trying to avoid dh - who does annoying things like try to talk to us!

We do have a system where we all double check on each other though. Right now dh gets up then after his shower double checks to make sure our oldest is up, after his shower our oldest checks on our younger son. Last year the boys would double check on me before they left the house (6:25!) but this year I'm not working so they don't. If my dh isn't going to work for some reason, I get up long enough to make sure the boys are up and then go back to bed. I can usually hear the shower going or something when they're up and just go right back to sleep.

So for us, the big worry is oversleeping. We prefer NOT to interact in the morning and just get out the door as quickly as possible. We spend most afternoons and evenings together, but don't talk to us in the morning!

 

[MELSMICE]

This is the first year that DH & I don't regularly get up with our girls that are still in high school - they are seniors. They are both in student government & have to be at school any time between 6 -7 a.m. every day. On most mornings I will hear them getting ready & on some days I'll get up to kiss them good-bye.

They drive my car to school & DH & I go pick it up later in the day when I need it. We both own our own businesses & do a lot of work from home, so this works for us.

I do feel bad some mornings that I don't get up with them, but when 5:45 or 6 a.m. rolls around & I hear them rustling about I remember that I got up with them every day for 12 years & the guilt leaves real quick!

 

[bubie2.5]

I have a 10 month old, so I can't contribute to the thread, but after reading a few replies I have a question. Why do kids have to get up so early to go to school? 5:30!! Is this normal?

 

[KAMKIM]

My kids have to get up at 6:20 at the latest, they have an early bus.

They are 8 and 5 so I will be getting up with them for years to come.

 

[disykat]

Depending on school bus schedules in your community, some schools have to start early. For us, the order is junior high & high school 0 hour, then high school, then elementary. The bus comes to our neighborhood at 6:25, 7:25, and 8:25.

 

[bubie2.5]

Depending on school bus schedules in your community, some schools have to start early. For us, the order is junior high & high school 0 hour, then high school, then elementary. The bus comes to our neighborhood at 6:25, 7:25, and 8:25.

Thanks! At what time do they have to be in school?

 

[NotUrsula]

(At high schools here, first bell is 7:15 am. Middle school is 7:35, elementary is 7:50. Exactly the reverse of what it should be, if you ask me.)

As to our house, I can't answer the poll, because *I* am the one who needs waking up. DH wakes all of us, disgustingly perky morning person that he is. Alarm clocks don't cut it for me, as I've been known to sleep through industrial fire klaxons mounted right above my bed. I am very much an axle-dragger in the morning. The kids take after me, which annoys DH just no end.

If DH has to be out of town overnight, the only way that I have any hope of managing to get the kids out on time is by setting the radio and television in our room to go off at FULL volume 3 hours before I need to leave -- the neighbors don't particularly appreciate that, because sometimes it's more than an hour before the sound manages to penetrate my consciousness. (Their house is 8 feet from mine.) My natural pattern is to wake up at around 10 am, and it really doesn't matter what time I go to bed; wake me up any time before that and I cannot be trusted to be fully conscious.

DS is 12, and on weekends if DH leaves early to go somewhere, he tends to surface before I do and get himself up for whatever he needs to do. The crack of dawn that school requires, however, is just too much for him to manage naturally at this point in his life. As it is, DH wakes him 30 minutes before they leave, and he tends to need to be reminded to comb his hair and brush his teeth before rolling out the door.

As a kid I lived in a rural community and had to catch my bus at 6 am. My mother's normal routine to wake me was to throw ice water in my face.

 

[hereyago]

OK, I am a bad mom. When DD11 started 4th grade, she wanted some independence, walk to the school-which she was zoned for. So I did wake up with her at first, but my 2 days off are doing the week. So why would I want to get up earlier? I am a self confessed non morning person. Plus, she wanted to get herself off to school.

Last year, 5th grade, she started doing her own toast and toaster streudel if she wanted a warm breakfast.

This year is middle school, 6th grade. She has to wake up at 6:30 to get herself ready, breakfast and then walk to the bus stop at the end of the street. Since this was a earlier time, the first 2 weeks, I would get up to make sure she was up and now she is on her own.

As a child, DM was well very lacking. So at age 5, I learned to make my own cereal and pb and j sandwich. I would wake up to alarm clock and DF would come home-he was the maintence man where we lived and he would take me to school. However, by middle school, we had moved and he worked someplace different and it was up to me.

 

[Darsa]

If we are all up, we spend our morning trying to avoid dh - who does annoying things like try to talk to us!

I can completely understand where you're coming from here!!

 

[Tinker'n'Fun]

DD is a senior in HS and DS is a freshman. DH gets up with them every day. DS had soccer practice at 6am in the beginning of the year so DH had to get them up really early. Soccer is over now so they leave 15 minutes apart and both are very stubborn about being alone to eat, so DH gets them up at different times. He brings them up the 5 houses to the bus stop so they are not outside. I do not get up in the morning (illness) but do make the lunches every night for everyone. And if someone happens to be sick during the night or just needs company, they come to me...

DH - morning person
Me - night person
Kids - spoiled

 

[bubie2.5]

(At high schools here, first bell is 7:15 am. Middle school is 7:35, elementary is 7:50. Exactly the reverse of what it should be, if you ask me.)

I'm NOT a morning person, this is going to be hard. I better get all the sleep I can NOW.

 

[NMAmy]

That was me when I was younger! Mornings were so miserable because my dad seemed to take personal offense at the fact that I didn't want to speak in the mornings and he'd almost always pick a fight with me. On the mornings he just left me alone, or if my mom was off work (she wouldn't let him bother me when she was around) I was perfectly fine keeping to myself and I'd be cheerful by the time I left the house.

My DS ended up getting that lovely morning personality from me, so I just don't speak to him unless it's necessary. My husband started going through a phase like my dad where it ticked him off that DS was so miserable in the mornings, but thankfully he wasn't as bad as my own father was.

DD got it from her dad. I am absolutely a morning person. One day, her stepmother called me all upset about getting in a fight with dd in the morning. I told her to just leave her alone--and asked if she'd noticed that dd behaved EXACTLY like her very own husband acted?

I'm a little surprised at all the people waking up their high schoolers. It's a bit foreign to me--my own mother taught me how to get up with an alarm clock, make my own breakfast and lunch, and run outside to catch the bus when I was 6 years old. She even showed me how to climb up on the counter to get my own cereal bowl. Then I spent the next 6 years getting my younger sister ready, as well, until I went to junior high and left earlier. My mom is not a morning person, either.