Unique Situation: Blended Family needs help!

[BFN]

Hi everyone

I'm writing today in hopes that someone has experienced something similar to our situation and may have some advice.

I have a 9yo stepdaughter who attends our neighborhood school (shared custody with mom); in order to allow her to do this and have access to better teachers and a better curriculum, the deal was that I would provide transport to and from her mother's home.  That was prior to last school year and my pregnancy.  She spends two weeks with us, then switches and spends two weeks with mom, so every two weeks, I'm up at 5:30am to go pick her up, get her home, dressed, fed, and packed off to the bus for school, while the other two weeks I don't need to be up until 7am to do the same.

The rub really comes with my now-13 week old son.  We've been on-demand feeding up until now, and frankly, I'm tired; this kid sleeps about five hours into the night and then wakes up every hour after.  So we're attempting to get him on a sleep and feeding schedule (thus, what brings me here).  Unfortunately, you can't explain to a baby why you have to get up an hour and a half earlier every two weeks.

I know a solid routine is important.  I want to establish one for my son, but I'm not sure how to go about it.  My husband isn't much help (and I don't mean that in a bad way) as he has to get up at 5:30am himself to go to work; I can't just leave the baby with him and go pick up our daughter.  Her mother is one of those moms who probably never should have been a mom; she makes her decisions selfishly and never puts the kids first, so asking her to take over dropoff duty is not an option.

The way I'm seeing it is that my only option is to always get up at 5:30am (and always get my son up at that time), which kills me a little bit.  Even if I do that, half the time, he'll be in a carseat driving 60mph down the freeway, so we can't have activity time, and our whole schedule is thrown off by dropoffs in the afternoon.

UGH. So annoying.  Here's a basic outline of our routines on Mom Weeks vs Dad Weeks:

Mom Week:
5:30am - Up, get dressed, change the baby, feed the baby, pack hubby's lunch
6:15am - Shoo everyone out the door.
7:00am - Pickup from mom's house
7:30am - Home, ten minutes til bus; do final inspection before kid heads out the door, make lunch.
7:45am - Daughter off the to the bus.
--
3:10pm - Daughter home from school
3:20pm - Shuttle back to mom's.
4:30pm - Home again, start dinner, hubby normally gets home (and takes the baby!)
5ish pm - Eat
--
9pm - All people everywhere into bed

Dad Week:
5:30am - Hubby is up
6:15am - Hubby out the door
6:30am - I'm up, dressing, teeth brushing, email checking, etc.  Pack lunch.
7am - Daughter is up, dressed, eating breakfast.  Get the baby up, changed, fed.
7:30am - Final inspections
7:45am - Daughter off to school
--
3:10pm - Daughter home, does homework, etc.
--
4:30pm - Hubby home, start dinner
5ish pm - Eat
--
8pm - Bedtime for daughter (baby is usually asleep right now)
9pm - All people everywhere into bed

To make matters even more complicated, two days out the week, our daughter has swim lessons or karate in the afternoon.  We are not constantly on the go, but sometimes it sure feels like it...  E.A.S.Y. seems like it would only fit for people who stay at home all day and have a quiet household    Like I said, any help would be appreciated Thanks!

[jessmum46]

Hi there, I'm sorry you haven't had any replies yet.  I can't say I have experienced your personal situation (and can I just say I really feel for you - it can't be easy) but I'll see if we can help with some general principles and ideas you might be able to use. 

My first thought with the early morning weeks is could you feed LO and re-settle him to sleep in the car seat? Then start your LO's day from 7/7.30ish when you get home from picking up your daughter?  That way you could always have your day starting at roughly the same time?

EASY does work well if you aren't constantly on the go and out of the house, but that's not to say it can't work if you are a busy mum with other children to consider.  Every person here with more than one LO knows that! 

If you take it back to its basic principles, EASY is a structured way of planning the day so LO knows what to expect.  That means eating, then some activity time (all time awake is activity time, you don't have to be doing an activity per se - ie awake in the car seat could be activity time), then a sleep.  Repeat throughout the day.  The exact clock times are less important.  Which means if necessary you can adjust things to fit the needs of different days.

Although Tracy was a firm proponent of independent sleep, there's no reason why if it works for your family that LO can't have sleeps out and about in the car/stroller if necessary.  Perhaps on the days you need to be out at activities he could do that?  And then have sleeps in the cot at home when things are less hectic?  I think to an extent second (and third, fourth...) children just have to be a bit more flexible.   It may mean naps are sometimes cut short but you can out him to bed early on those days to make up for it.

What do you think?