Mornings around my house used to be anything but rushed and stressful. When I was a stay-at-home mom my kids and I would wake up at about 7:30, eat breakfast together, and get ready for whatever activity that we had planned for that day. Those were the days, because everything changed a few months ago when I decided to re-enter the workforce. The first few weeks were a chaotic mess, because none of us were used to being on such a time crunch in the morning. It wasn’t until I started to implement a few strategies that our mornings went from mayhem to easy like Sunday morning.

Prepare On Sunday

Sundays serve as our day of preparation and is key for us to have stress free weekday mornings. I start by washing and conditioning my daughter’s hair and putting it into a protective style for the week, which is usually a two-strand twist style. I preserve her hair by tying it down with a silk scarf and a bonnet every night. In the mornings I take a few minutes to slick down her edges, add her bows, and she is good to go. Having a go to protective style for my daughter has made a world of difference in our mornings.

Sunday is also the day that I also get all outfits together for the week, including mine. Because I work from home it can be quite tempting to lounge around in yoga pants all day, but I’ve found that my productivity shoots through the roof when I get dressed in semi-business casual attire, so when I get their clothes ready for the week I get mine together too.

Wake Up Before The Kids

I rarely used to wake up before my kids, but now I get up at least an hour before they do and it’s made a world of difference. I find that I feel incredibly less rushed and more relaxed if I’ve given myself enough time to workout, shower, get dressed, and do my mom on the go makeup routine. I also love the fact that I am completely dressed and ready to go by the time that they wake up so I can fully devote my attention to them.

Set Up The Night Before

I like to go room by room the night before to make sure that everything is neat and tidy so that we don’t have to worry about waking up to chaos. It’s something about waking up to things out of order that stresses me out, so I like to start each day with a clean slate. I also like to make sure that backpacks are packed with extra clothes and snacks for my kids, the coffee maker is set up, and breakfast (hard boiled eggs and overnight oats) are prepped and ready the night before.

Use Music To Set The Tone

I like to set the tone for our day by waking my kids up to soft worship music. Once everyone is awake and moving around we then go to something more upbeat like a Tye Tribbett album so that the kids can dance around a bit. Once we get in the car, Disney Junior’s “Dance Party” is always on the playlist. I like to make our morning routine as relaxing and as fun as possible, and music seems to do the trick to put us all in a great mood.

What are some things that you do to make your mornings more relaxed?