Louise and I both believe that one of the most important things you can teach your children is to be self reliant. To this end we work hard to teach both Ben and Jessica skills like getting dressed by themselves and getting their own breakfast.
Now, this is not the easiest course of action and often enough backfires. You’ll come down in the morning to find the fridge door wide open with a pool of milk on the floor next to it. Just yesterday Jessica got dressed on her own initiative but used one of her tops as a skirt.
However, it does pay off in the long run. Just a year ago the average time I’d get up on a weekend was 7am. This morning the children still got up at 7am but when I rolled out of bed at 8am they’d been playing nicely together (modulo one screaming argument which they resolved without our help) and had already eaten their breakfast together.