Weekends - are they easier or harder in your house? For some of us, the weekend means an extra adult around more - whether or not that helps or makes things tougher for you, I can’t say. Falling into a different rhythm on the weekend can set everyone on edge, and make kids (and grownups) feel adrift. We struggled with weekends for a long time after Birdie arrived. We’d start Saturday with a hope of relaxation, but without a plan about how that might happen. T and I would each have a vision for how we’d churn through housework and carve out a few minutes for ourselves - but we each tried to get on with it without really talking about it first. By 11am everyone was frustrated, grumpy, and we were still in our PJs in a messy house.
Things started to get a lot calmer and more fun once we treated weekends like special days that had a clear, repeating rhythm of their own. We start the weekend on Friday night, when we have a family meeting over bathtime to talk about what we all hope might happen over the weekend, and remember any special plans we have coming up. Our hopes are often small: hoovering the house, making kimchi or cookies, seeing friends or calling an aunt or uncle. A usually hopes to listen to stories or watch an extra programme on Sundays, when he’s allowed around 30min of screen time.
T attends a pilates class first thing on Saturday mornings, so I lay out our Saturday table similar to our weekday table, with morning time activities and play dough at the ready. Because A’s had two days off from morning time by Saturday, he’s usually happy to dive back in. The kids know that as soon as T returns from his class, we get ready for A’s dance class. Birdie gets some one-on-one Daddy time while A and I head to his class, and after we get home we all work together to tidy and get housework done for an hour or so. The kids play or listen to stories, and T and I swap out doing the things we’d planned on Friday evening. We do some science over teatime, and spend an hour or so outside in the garden or at our local green space. We almost always make some kind of easily-deconstructed, kid-friendly curry on Saturday nights, and we call one set of grandparents each per day, just before bedtime.
Sundays are for family time, adventure, or seeing friends. If we’re headed out in the morning, we pack lunches and bags on Saturday night so that the morning can be as calm as possible. If we’re staying home, I make waffles and we listen to ‘Sunday Music’ and dance around the kitchen. Friends come over or we meet up with them somewhere outdoors. Sunday suppers are simple - using up leftovers or anything that requires very little clean up - because Sunday evenings after the kids are in bed is ‘dreaming time’, when T and I talk about our hopes and plans and work together to see how we could move closer to them in the next week.
With two or more young children, trying to have ‘relaxing’ weekends that are free-form and unscheduled can make things feel pretty fraught. Even if one child is happy to play independently with trains or blocks while the adults talk or drink tea, the other child or children is bound to have a different agenda! Adults feel frustrated that they can’t get anything done - or have time alone to recharge - and kids easily mirror this frustration back.
Having small children is a season....a fleeting one. It will feel like slow, peaceful Sundays full of reading and quiet play are aeons away if you’ve got two or three happy, busy, energetic small children rocketing around your kitchen. A weekend rhythm can help to harness that energy and let it lead your whole family through a more calm, connected weekend.
If you’re feeling stuck in weekends that are stressful and unbalanced, I’d love to work with you to help you find more calm and playfulness - even during this busy stage of life. I’ve opened up more one-to-one mentorship spaces for the next two months because I want to connect with as many of you as possible, helping you to be the respectful, mindful, feminist parent that you want to be.
You can find out about coaching sessions here: Work With Me.