A New Routine

I love the holidays, waking when I want to not when the
alarm says and having the freedom to just see what the day brings. Often
though, I find that if I don’t have a plan for the day it can just slip away
with a feeling of not having done very much at all, which for me is not such a
great feeling.

So now September is here and I am back into my “work”
routine, which as well as my lovely classes includes school runs, taxi service
to various after school activities and all those other numerous things needed
to keep the family running, I find myself feeling more settled, more focused
and more relaxed because I know better what to expect each day.

It’s well documented that our little ones too benefit from
familiar routines and activities.  They
help them to feel secure in their world, giving them the confidence to explore
and discover new things, because they know the familiar things, like mummy and
their favourite teddy, are there if they need them. But what about parents and
particularly new parents?

When I was at home with my daughter when she was small I
always liked to have something planned for each day. I disliked facing each
morning with that “what shall we do today” feeling (once in a while is fine, but
not every day!). It can be quite a transition from working full time and having
the day planned out for you to having numerous empty hours stretching ahead with
just a newborn for company, so I needed some routine.

Sometimes our plan was simply a coffee with a friend, but I
also liked to have something planned for my daughter too, and we did a whole
range of regular activities and outings together. Not only was it nice to get
out and meet people do different things, but I also feel that we both benefitted
from having that focused time for and with each other and that things that we
did were also helping to boost her development.

Even at a very young age she would recognize a familiar place
where we did a regular class, and I am sure that the recognition and familiarity
of some of our routines helped her to enjoy and get more out of the activity
than she would otherwise have done.

Running Tots Play now, I love to see that same look of
recognition and excitement on the faces of many of the children who come along
each week. I am always amazed at how quickly the older babies and toddlers
start to join in with the warm up activities that they come to know because we
do them the same way at each class, and love the pride they have in themselves
at what they are accomplishing.

But the benefits are not just for the children. At the start
of each of our Baby Development courses, when asked to tell the group why they
have come along to the classes, getting out of the house is always one of the
answers that our new mums give, and even those parents with slightly older ones
tell me that one of the reasons they look forward to their weekly class is that
they know it will get them out and enjoying time with their child.

So leaving aside the benefits gained from the activities
themselves, I hope that Tots Play, and other classes like it can help those who,
like me, need a bit of routine when their world has, in all other ways, just
been turned upside down with the arrival of a new little one. See you same time
next week!