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I wake up with the baby and we nurse. I try to get him dressed and ready for the day before DS1 is up. But usually he wakes while we're still nursing. He'll read a book or two in the baby room until we're done. Then we get DS1 dressed in his room. We all come down to eat breakfast. DS1 eats his yogurt and I feed the baby and have a cup of coffee. My mom sometimes comes at that point and I take DS1 (sometimes she does if I have an early morning meeting) to school. Otherwise I pack them both up in the car, drop DS1 off, and then come back home to work and my mom watches DS2.

DS1 only goes every other day so we prep him the night before about our school mornings and he's usuallyvery compliant!

DH leaves for work around 6. He goes in and says hello to each kid and leaves. I escort DS to bathroom for potty and grab DD out of her crib. We then brush DS teeth and I get dressed. Once I'm dressed and teeth brushed, we head to DS room. I lay out clothes night before so no clothes discussion. While he gets dressed, DD plays in DS room. We then head to DD room. While I get her dressed DS looks at DD books. We all 3 then head downstairs for quick breakfast. I take dog outside quickly and turn on car to heat up, it's sooo cold! I then come in, let kids finish breakfast and we head out door. It takes an hour from start to finish.

Keys are clothes laid out, quick breakfast and book packs/water bottles ready night before.

@winniebee: DS1 doesn't usually have a big breakfast on school days! He has milk, yogurt, maybe a piece of toast or cereal! So I just throw the dishes in the sink! Other days everything is just as is on the table and I get to it later in the day! DS2 is still mostly just on purees, and we feed him so most of the mess is on him than the kitchen floor!

What are you trying to make for breakfast? Even heating up a breakfast sandwich is a lot of work for us. We stick to pre-made stuff. I even keep baggies of cereal on hand pre-portioned so we are ready to grab and run.

Another life saver, their cups of milk from bedtime, we just refill at night and keep in the fridge overnight. For morning, we just hand them their cups and they have their morning drink. Cups are set by the sink before we leave (usually dumped and rinsed but not washed or anything)>

@winniebee: we do very simple breakfasts. Smoothies, bananas and muffins. Not much mess.

@winniebee: Still, most of those things can be made ahead!

Egg muffins are great and super easy. You can experiment with different combinations of adding potatoes or sausage or cheese or veggies.

@winniebee: My kids are older and my husband is home with us until 7 (I have them from 7-drop off at 8) and there is no way we could manage cooking breakfast. Occasionally he will do some eggs if we all wake up really early but its a rare treat.

We make hot breakfasts for LO1 every morning and when I was in mat leave, I had both girls by myself and LO1 was in school twice a week. I would dress her as soon as she woke up. Then do her breakfast and put her in her chair to eat....while she ate, I did her hair then nursed the baby. After she finished eating, I would grab her bag and lunch (packed the night before), load the girls into the stroller and put shoes on then and then head out to the elevator w both kiddos. If she didn't eat breakfast, I would pack it to take to school where they would try again.

We don't tend to have crying and tantrums in the morning, so that's probably just personality.

I had to wake up and dress myself before the kids woke up. Right now, I'm back at work and my husband solo patents twice a week and he showers and dresses before the girls wake up (he gets up at 6, toddler is up between 6:15-6:30), then he dresses and feeds them both.

I have no advice because I'm not in your shoes (but still find "life with two" posts interesting )
Could you ask the nanny to start coming at 7 instead? I would think that an extra 45 mins could greatly help you and would be worth any extra expense. I know mine comes at 8am twice a week but if I asked her to come at 7 she'd be more than happy to make an extra hour of pay. But she's a morning person!

So, I don't have to take my kids to day care every day but I do have to get them out really early two days a week for early morning Bible studies and get togethers. I can get the kids out of the house in 30 minutes flat if I've done two things - dress them before they go downstairs (so, they get out of bed and are immediately dressed) and have breakfast already made. I try to throw together an easy crockpot breakfast or an easy breakfast casserole for the oven the night before (it takes 5-10 minutes to put together tops so the same amount of time I'd be spending in the morning and it has sausage, hash browns and eggs) because my kids also like a big breakfast. I bake it first thing when I (or my husband depending on the day) wake up so that feeding them is easy and something I don't have to think about on those days we have to practically run out the door.

@brownie: We have done several mornings like that too. If you fight or can't make a decision, we put her in the car seat and then grab the rest of our stuff and go. I will dress her in the van before we head into school.

@winniebee: Can you get your nanny to do light housework? Our nannies have always picked up the morning's catastrophe, unloaded/loaded dishwasher, kids laundry, etc. It is SUCH a huge help just to come home and the dishwasher has been ran and unloaded.

I put the car seat with DS #1's coat and shoes in it on the landing the night before. I make DS #2's bottles the night before as well. I get dressed before the kids on both week and weekend days. When it's not my turn to take them to school/daycare, I get up at 5:15am (hopefully without baby waking up too), get ready, and head the Metra stop walking distance from our house for work. I still make bottles and get the car seat by our bedroom for DH because he can be flighty and unorganized in the morning.

I tend to the baby first, feed, and then dress him. Then take the car seat with stuff into big brother's room. There we wake him up and get ready. He stalled a lot this morning, but negotiated with him to get dressed and downstairs. We have coats and shoes on before going downstairs. Hugely helpful. Then, I grab bottles from fridge and donuts for DS #1 for the 3 minute car ride to daycare. Getting stuff ready night before is absolutely key to mornings going smoothly. Some mornings are worse than others.

I don't have 2 to get out the door in the mornings (yet) and DH does the daycare drop offs most days, but he's forgetful so I have to prep everything the night before for him.

- I pack the daycare bags and place them in the car the night before. I pack some Nutrigrain bars or snacks in the bag that DH can hand to DS if he's hungry on the way home.
- We leave DS' shoes in the car - we carry him into the car and put his shoes on before unbuckling him from his carseat. We always take his shoes off and leave them back in the car before we take him out of the carseat when we get home.
- I make DS' entire breakfast the night before and cut it all up and put it on a sectioned plate. (I buy them frequently from the dollar bin at Target). It fits inside a gallon sized ziploc bag and DH knows just to microwave the plate for 15 seconds and then add fresh fruit in the morning, like a banana. So I cut up pancakes, drizzle syrup on top, chop up a turkey sausage patty and whatever else he might want and stick it in the fridge. I also leave a sippy cup of milk with a piece of painter's tape on it that says MILK (bc DH can never tell the difference between the water cups and milk cups).
- I lay out DS' outfit on the guest room bed the night before so that DH can just get him dressed in there in the morning without struggling or chasing him around (as opposed to changing on the floor or something).

@winniebee: how long do you have between wake-up(s) and getting out the door? my girls are usually up somewhere between 630-730a, and then we need to be out the door by 8:50a, so we have 1.5+ hrs each morning. there is no playing unless we have time between eating/getting ready & walking out the door.

we tried getting dressed before breakfast (and sometimes K still wants to...because she sings the "clothes on, eat breakfast, brush teeth, put on shoes & off to school" song from Daniel Tiger). but i swear she always picks to eat something messy on those mornings, and then her clothes are dirty before we even come close to leaving the house.