Getting back into our new school routine post lockdown

I literally cannot believe it has been nearly 6 months since the kiddies last stepped foot in their school. We have overcome some incredible challenges as a family and now we face the baby steps back into a new school routine. Well, as normal as it can be for the moment. The school have made a lot of changes and we are all trying our best to keep up! Here are a few tips on how I am helping the children to adapt into this new normal and keep anxieties at bay.

Getting a good nights sleep

I have to hold my hands up to not keeping a good bedtime routine during lockdown. Some days the kids were up really late and other nights they were still going to bed later than they normally would. It is so hard to get back to normal, which is the kids being in bed by 7:30pm. It seems like a million miles away at the moment. I am starting to introduce earlier bedtimes incrementally; getting earlier by 10-15 minutes each day until we are going to sleep at a better time. Our kiddies should be getting around 10 hours of sleep a night. They are lucky to get 8 at the moment as they always get up so early! Our bedtime routine is:

• Eat our evening meal as a family
• Dog walk or snuggle time (depending on the weather)
• Clean and get ready for bed
• Listen to Alexa bedtime stories for 30 minutes in bed
• Sleep

I have now added a bonus step into our routine; I spray the children’s pillows with the Child’s Farm baby bedtime pillow spray. It is a vegan friendly spray, that smells very subtly of tangerines. It’s £8 and has become a staple part of our bedtime routine. Tangerine oil has naturally calming benefits very similar to lavender. I didn’t know that until I read about this product!

Encouraging good hand hygiene

As you can imagine, ensuring the kiddies keep their hands clean is the top of all parents agenda at the moment. It isn’t any surprise that Child’s Farm added a new hand wash to their collection this year; the moisturising hand wash is made from coconut, which leaves skin hydrated and clean. Another fab vegan friendly product to add to your next shopping list! We all sing the Happy Birthday song to make sure we wash our hands correctly and we try to role play different scenarios too – like they are about to embark on an adventure and need to have clean hands, or about to do surgery and have to wash their hands like a doctor would. Just little things to encourage them to have a little fun using their imagination.

Healthy tummy, healthy mind

With school lunches and the routine at school changing for this too, we are making sure the kiddies have healthy and fun lunches for school. I have always been a huge fan of Organix and when I was sent these fab new Gruffalo Claws, I had a little fun with them. Look at my silly video below:

So, they are technically aimed at toddlers but the kids love these Gruffalo Claws and so do us grown ups! They come in Barbecue, Tomato and Herb and Cheese and Onion. They are made from corn and have no added salt and coated with yummy flavours like apple, tomato and onion. They come in packs of 4. A great way of encouraging the children to eat their school lunches and have a healthy snack at the same time.

A walk a day….

The children’s mental health is a big consideration for me, more so than normal. All of this change and all of these rules have made it extremely hard for me, as an adult, to contend with. So, I can only imagine it effects our kiddies in a similar way. We started walking the dogs every morning during lockdown and it is something I want to continue with the kiddies moving out of lockdown. That walk, the fresh air and getting out of the house is a great way of encouraging mindfulness and helps the children find space to think.

If you have any tips on getting the children back into a new school routine, I would love to hear about them in the comments below. The school has so many new and different rules, a lot has changed and these are my tips on how I am trying to help the children adapt.