Local Aubrey author, Darnell Lewis, is instilling simple morning routines for kids that stick.
As a parent of two himself, he draws on his own experience in his book “Brush, Wash, Dress: Morning SUCCESS!” and aims to help children and parents with their morning routines in an entertaining, rhythmic way.
“I had struggled with both of my boys,” Lewis said. “My first son was very, very hard. He just didn't want to get up in the morning, and I'm going, ‘come on, we got to get going. I have to drive far, all of that.’ So, it was a struggle to get him up. So, in certain cases, I had to do some similar steps within the book. I had to make it fun.”
Lewis did this in several ways, including through song and dance and lots of tickles.
“Eventually, it got to the point where it was fun,” he said. “Sometimes he would get up and be ready. And I'm like, ‘Oh my gosh, what happened there?’ He's like, ‘Dad, I'm ready to go.”
Throughout most of his life, Lewis did not enjoy reading. His motto was, “I'll wait until the movie comes out,” but that changed after he and his wife had children, he said. He wanted them to have a love of reading.
“I have a 25-year-old and 19-year-old sons,” Lewis said. “And I would read to them every single night, both of them. We read seven days a week. I didn't stop. And there would be times they wouldn't go to sleep until they said, ‘Daddy, daddy, daddy, time to read, time to read.’ So, I guess the reading, I instilled it in my boys at a young age, and it just came through with me.”
The inspiration to write the children’s book came after he and his wife were getting ready to go out for lunch, when he saw something on television about a parent having difficulty getting their child ready for school in the morning.
“I'm thinking, ‘Oh, man, I wonder if I could create a book about that?’” he said.
He'd never imagined writing a children’s book until that point.
“The next thing you know, I literally created the book in like 15 minutes,” Lewis said. “But it sat on the shelf for four years.”
The first-time author was dealing with some self-doubt and wanted to wait for AI to improve before using it for his graphics.
“A buddy of mine at work said, ‘Darnell, you're wasting time,’” Lewis said. “He says, ‘I think you have something on your hands. You need to go on and do it.’ So, I went home and in two days, literally two hours on a Monday, two hours on a Tuesday, I did my first version of it. And he's like, ‘Man, that is great.’ And then I went to a second version, and then a third version.”
Lewis said, finally content, he released the book in 2026.
Besides morning routines, the message that Lewis hopes to instill in young minds is a sense of independence.
“Once you get a child to understand that, hey, if you can conquer a few things during the day, you feel so much better about yourself,” he said. “So, washing their face, if they conquer that, they have that one little step of self-reliance. … When they conquer all of that, I'm hoping that it correlates into school, and then they can do better in school.”
Although it is a book geared toward children, Lewis shared that parents could learn something about themselves or their child from it.
“The majority of kids don't respond to yelling,” Lewis said. “They don't respond to that. The majority of them would prefer to have their parents talk to them softly [and] walk them through the process from there. So, with that being said, this book will help parents understand that each child can be reared differently.”
The book is available on Amazon and on his website at bluboxpublishing.com.
Lewis shared that by signing up for the newsletter, followers can receive color sheets that match the book, along with surprises.
“Once they get the book, I'm hoping they will be able to finalize that morning routine and help the parents complete their morning,” Lewis said. “So, it's not all frustration. It actually is … happy.”
