How YouTube Is Transforming Our Mornings

Let me start by saying I'm almost too embarrassed to post this.  It doesn't feel right to admit that we start our day in front of a screen.  But let me back up and tell you about our summer mornings.  

I might sit on my bed nursing Macie while the kids get up.  The boys tend to wake first and they eat breakfast and sometimes watch Wild Kratts on TV.  Then the girls get up and join the boys.  If I'm still in my room, the kids start playing Legos until I remind them to get dressed and do their chores before they have free time.  An hour later we realize Alaine never ate breakfast and no one emptied the dishwasher.  A few kids argue about who gets to play magnetic darts first and I spend the hours nagging about what's not getting done instead of investing in quality time with my kids! The morning slips away before I've had a shower, and when I peek into the bedrooms around lunchtime, I notice an unmade bed. 

Maybe the answer is to make a morning schedule and to require more responsibility and accountability, but we're choosing another way.

Now as soon as the kids come out of their rooms in the morning, Owen holds Macie while I make my bed.  Then we all congregate in the living room.  Macie nurses or plays on the floor while the rest of us watch Good Mythical Morning together. Good Mythical Morning is a clean, talkshow-esque YouTube channel that puts out a funny 10-15 minute video every morning.  (Their ninth season is ending on Friday, but there are scads of old shows we can catch up on.  Season 10 begins August 1.) 

Once our non-morning people have laughed themselves awake, we watch Five Minute Family Devotional. Five Minute Family Devotional, another YouTube channel, reviews men and women from the Bible chronologically.  It ends with 1-2 discussion questions and a suggested prayer topic. The channel releases several episodes per week.  So far there are eleven of a total twenty-five.  (The channel is a division of JellyTelly, which is part of  What's in the Bible? {affiliate link}, a brand we love!)

All told, our viewing lasts less than a half hour, but it centers us and puts us all in one place to begin the day. I'm available to make sure everyone has eaten and begun their morning routine and chores, and it  makes it easy to move on studying the body on Mondays or read books with Alaine on the other days.  (I'm sharing some of our favorite picture book on the blog's Facebook page a few times a week.)

Best of all, it gives me an opportunity to laugh and share with all my kids...and make a few memories, too!

(Click here for other posts in this series.)