Tips for shortcuts in getting through life with kids.

Life is busy. Kids are demanding. As much as you might want to do a job properly, sometimes shortcuts are required just to stay sane. Here’s a few I’ve collected along the way! Lets just hope my husband (neat freak) doesn’t read this.

1. I have been known to vacuum crumbs from the kitchen bench. It’s allowed.

2. Getting dressed “off the rack”.This ain’t no fashion term, just pull all the clothes required for the family straight off the drying rack. No folding or putting away required. The downside is that you tend to wear the same clothes on a three day cycle.

3. A lady with four kids, yes four, puts them all in the bath together. She gets one big bowl of dinner (risotto or short pasta would work) and feeds them all in a row. Then she washes the food from them, pulls the plug and rinses away all remnants of dinner. No dishes, no benches to wipe and no messy kids. The downside is that bath outlets aren’t made for food scraps so the plumber might need to pay a visit after a while.

4. Shut the kitchen. I give my kids a five minute warning that the meal is over and then the kitchen is shut! Otherwise breakfast can go for two hours. I leave out a plate of cut up fruit…and they’re on their own until the kitchen opens again. Tough but fair.

5. A midwife in hospital said to me “always get your dinner done in the morning”. Great advice as I tend to get crunched around 5pm with bath, bottles and tired babies. So I either stick on the slow cooker around 10am (perfect if theres two dinner sittings) or peel all the vegetables and put them in a steamer. I even put the water in so all I have to do is turn a dial and cook some meat. It makes life so much easier!

6. Clean up only at the end of the day. I struggle with this one as a messy house does drive me crazy. My busy friend (two kids) only wipes down the kitchen bench at the end of the day. Not for me, but if I could guarantee no-one was going to drop in, then maybe….