Making family Christmas just a little bit calmer

Measure twice, cut once.

I’m building a shed at the moment. Over a year in the making. Progress is slow because life is busy and it’s never going to make it high on the priority list.

That phrase is something I’ve learned, and relearned. It’s all about preparation and it applies to family life too.

Yesterday over dinner my son asked about the weekend. This ‘what’s coming up in the future’ conversation is a near daily one in our house — what’s going happen today, tomorrow, this week and weekend, on Christmas eve and day (no waking us up before 7:15).

We’ve found it helps keep the kids calmer and therefore me more patient with them. It makes for fewer unexpected surprises that tend to trigger tantrums.

Of course it doesn’t work with toddlers, who wanted their toast cut into triangles two seconds ago and now you’ve done it, their world has crumbled. Their brains just haven’t developed enough yet to make sense of reality. But getting into the habit certainly helps because it does work with helping older children stay that bit calmer.

We started with a wall chart — days of the week and pictures and single words saying what was happening each day — Monday Nursery, Tuesday Mum, Wednesday Mum, Thursday Dad etc. Now like I said, ‘what’s next?’ is a daily conversation. Which is good because what comes next can be a whole lot of fun if you make it so.

I used to be an angry, impatient dad. I’ve spent ten years researching and experimenting on how to be a more patient parent.

I’ve distilled what works into a book. The Patient Parent is a short, practical book for busy parents who want to make the most of the precious time with their kids before they grow up.

If that’s you, why not give the book a go?