The Best SAHM Morning Routine for a Happier Day!
An effective SAHM morning routine can make or break the rest of your day. But despite what you may think, it doesn’t have to be complicated at all!
Why is Having a Morning Routine Important?
Having a morning routine, especially as a stay at home mom, seriously cuts down the number of decisions you have to make! Here’s the deal…
Having to decide what you will do every morning slows you down and takes your focus. That’s the opposite of what we need in our busy mornings.
Having a bit of structure to our mornings with a routine gives you a list of things to do which help you get organized and feel more productive.
Plus, having your own stay at home mom morning routine is actually good for the whole family, because it helps everyone get their days started on the right foot.
We need mornings to be the time of day when we can connect with ourselves and our kids, to knock out a few tasks or chores that don’t have to wait, and to set ourselves and our kids up for an easier day.
If mornings are a major sore spot in your day, keep reading!
Here’s What Happens When I Stick to My SAHM Morning Routine…
I have less to think about, because I already know what I’m more or less going to do each morning.
I am calmer and more prepared for the spots in each morning that are harder for my kids (like finding shoes, remembering homework & things like that).
And most importantly, I get to jump a bit ahead of my to-do list and cross one or two easy-to-do tasks off, which gets the momentum going for the day.
Here’s How To Make Your Very Own SAHM Morning Routine
The key to making a great morning routine is to SUBTRACT and AUTOMATE. You can’t pick just any habits and expect them to work well with your family’s schedule.
Once you’ve simplified your “must-do’s” then you will have some space and it’ll be super-easy to add some “wants” into your morning routine.
Let’s break down how to make the best morning routine for you, mom! It’s pretty easy, I promise:
1. Quickly list out the things that you currently find yourself doing every morning.
You can grab a paper and pen, or use the Notes app on your phone. These tasks usually include:
- Making & eating breakfast
- Making & packing lunches
- Maybe showering or exercising
- Spending a few minutes in bed with your partner or kids
- Packing school bags
- Picking out clothing
- Emptying the dishwasher/putting dishes away
- Wiping the counters/sweeping the floor
- Putting in a load of laundry
2. Highlight the tasks you can either give to someone else, or move to the evening before.
- Can the school snacks & backpacks be packed up by the kids the night before?
- Can everyone pick out their outfits in the evening after putting on their pjs?
- Can your spouse make an extra batch of their famous muffins or pancakes & throw them in the freezer, so the kids can microwave their own breakfast in the morning?
- Can you set your washing machine on a timer to start doing laundry an hour before you wake up, so that when you get up you just have to throw it in the dryer?
Get creative and enlist the help of the other hands in the house, to see what tasks can be taken off of your shoulders either partially or completely.
Really concentrate on the tasks that you like the LEAST. Can those tasks be simplified, moved away from your morning time, or given to someone else?
I have a YouTube video where I show you which tasks are perfect for moving to your evening routine.
3. Now that you have some more space in your morning time, sprinkle in some things you would LOVE to include in your SAHM morning routine…
Now’s the time to make a quick list of things you want to do, and NOT do, that would make your mornings easier.
It’s important that you “get what you want” here, within reason. You are more or less in charge of getting everything and everyone ready for the day ahead, and the less stressed you are, the better.
Here are some ideas to add to your list:
- If you are energized and focused in the morning, you might really want to Include some exercise, knock out a little bit of work, get a bit of cleaning done, or have a dance party with the littles before breakfast.
- On the other hand, if you are annoyed that you’re up so early, maybe you would rather do some mindless busy-work like pre-chopping the veggies for dinner, or just to sit for a few minutes with a favorite drink.
- If you are able to wake up before the kids and are enjoying the peace and quiet, you might want to try some journaling, yoga, meditation or reading.
If you’re having trouble coming up with ideas, I have another blog post with a morning routine formula.
If you really don’t have ANY idea what you want your mornings to look like, then think about which tasks or chores throughout your day you wish you could get over with sooner. See if it’s possible to move them to the morning, so you don’t have to worry about them once your day starts!
Keep this 2nd list handy, for when you find yourself with an unexpected pocket of free time.
My SAHM Morning Routine (With School Aged Kids):
So my morning routine used to consist of me doing everything myself:
- Making breakfast
- Making lunches
- Picking out everyone’s clothes
- Packing school bags, etc.
Now, I have some systems in place to make it easy for the other people in the house to more or less take care of their own things. That frees up space in my morning to do what I REALLY REALLY want to do in the mornings:
- Look over my planner so I know what I’m doing today,
- Put my phone away,
- Give my kids some independence, and
- Talk with & listen to my kids before they head off to school.
Anyway, morning time for me starts at about 6:45am, and ends about 9:00am:
6:45am:
- Wake up, head to kitchen
- Drink water
- Empty dishwasher if it’s still full
- Check my phone for any urgent matters
- Check my planner for any events/deadlines/errands & general to-do’s for the day
7:00am:
- Move laundry to the dryer
- Start making lunches
- Nudge kids awake
7:15am:
- Wake up kids (no more phone for me)
- Make breakfast together/supervise cutting fruits
- Pre-prep dinner if possible while I’m there
- Eat together
- Supervise kids making & packing snacks
7:45am:
- Gather school items, double check for anything needed that day
- Shoes, jackets, backpacks
8:00am:
- Head to school for drop offs
8:20am:
- Home to clear the kitchen counters
- Exercise 15 minutes
- Shower, get dressed
- Make coffee, set up an easy snack for later
9:00am:
- Start working
I don’t make breakfast for everyone, I don’t pick out clothes and I don’t track down school stuff. That used to DRIVE ME CRAZY every morning! Now I’m MUCH calmer and I have mental space and physical space for enjoying the morning with the family.
How To Stick To Your SAHM Morning Routine
I have some tips to get your sahm morning routine to be so easy and HELPFUL that you won’t stop using it & it’ll definitely stick:
- DON’T ADD AT FIRST! Take what you’re doing now and SUBTRACT. Subtract, simplify, delegate. THAT is what’s going to free up space & time for you to add things in.
- Make sure things are in the right order for you. Visualize your perfect morning and play it out in your head, so that you can move things around if necessary.
- Try to throw in at least one thing that you enjoy. This can be anything that you see or do that brings a smile to your face.
- If you’re getting stuck, send me a DM on Instagram or put it in the comments below, let’s brainstorm it out!
What To Do When You Fall Off Of Your Morning Routine
Here is the number ONE reason why moms drop their morning routines…
Because they took someone else’s routine and copy/pasted it into their day.
If you previously fell off your morning routine, chances are that you were trying to add somebody else’s morning into your day. Other people’s routines are excellent places for ideas and inspiration, but making a change that drastic & all at once is way too overwhelming, hard to remember and will most likely end in a lot of frustration.
If there is anything you want to add to your family’s morning routine, add it a little at a time, not all at once.
Live with it, try it, tweak it, move it around before & after other things, and get used to it. THEN add some more, if you even want to.
Remember, we want this to be easy! We don’t need more work to do on top of our number-one-all-time-most-important job, raising our children.
Mistakes You Might Be Making With Your Morning Routine
Besides adding too many new things to your mom morning routine like we just talked about, there are some other ways you may be making your mornings harder than they need to be. We want easy morning routines, & helpful starts to our day.
One way is by multitasking a little too much in the morning. As moms, we are pretty much multitasking all day long, there’s no getting around that. But, piling important task on top of equally important task, is a recipe for forgetting something.
Another mistake you may be making with your SAHM morning routine is spending too much time on social media and social networks in the morning. It’s another reason why we end up forgetting things, or getting distracted and not starting things on time.
It’s also not a great example to show the kids if we don’t want THEM to be on their phones first thing in the morning when they get phones.
Skipping breakfast is another big mom morning routine no-no. We need energy to run around all day too!
To Recap, Here Are The Steps to Making an Easy Stay at Home Mom Morning Routine:
- List out the things that you currently find yourself doing every morning.
- Highlight and simplify the tasks you can either give to someone else, or move to the evening before.
- Sprinkle in a few tasks at a time that you either enjoy doing, or that you want to get over with early, to help smooth out the rest of your day.
If this post was helpful to you, consider following me on Instagram! I share a lot of helpful tips to help moms smooth ot their day, to make way for the life you want.
I also wrote out my evening routine as a working mom, if you want to check it out!
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