My new BFF..

Time!!!

Throughout the past few years as a parent, I have learned to embrace time and all that it can help me with. Do not get me wrong there have many days where I feel that time is against me; however, for the most part, Time and I are BFFs.

How do I use the time to my advantage as a parent?

1. I am constantly keeping in mind the amount of time my child (or your child 🙂 ) is awake for. By adjusting your child’s wake time it can assist with night wakings, difficulties with your child going to sleep, and short naps. Here is a link to a Wake Times Chart.

2. Setting a timer as a reminder for me or our little man. I felt like I was a broken record at times when our young man was a Toddler or Preschool Aged Child. “It’s time to….” I began setting a timer and stating “when the timer goes off please go to the bathroom”. He would not fight with the timer.

3. Making cleaning up fun! I would set a stopwatch on my phone and time how fast our young man could pick up his toys. He loved this game so much that now he sets his own watch to try to beat the clock!

4. Give me extra time to get out the door. I will start the process of leaving the house 10 minutes before I have to as it seems to be a law that someone will have to use the bathroom on the way out the door. It is not always the youngest member of the family!

5. I keep in mind that it can take 3 to 4 weeks for a behavior to really change and often I will not see the complete change until the 6 to the 8-week mark. This allows me to cut myself some slack.

6. Our young man has specific times a day that he gets to watch a television show. He watches 2 to 3 shows a day at 8:00 am, 11:00 am and 4:00 pm. Why did I do this? Simple, to stop the “I want to watch a show”!! My answer now is “you certainly can at (insert proper time)”. When I do not have to say No as often the whining reduces.

7. Using a clock to assist with our young man knowing what time he can get up. He had a Gro-Clock for a long time. I put the brightness on zero and then the clock only came on when it was time to get up. Now that he understands time, he has an alarm clock. The alarm clock has red lights for the numbers (Red light does not interrupt the production of melatonin).

Do you have any additional way you use the time to your advantage? I would love to hear about them. Please place your answers in the comment section below this post.