The biggest challenge for any sahm is creating – and sticking to – a stay-at-home mom schedule.
And I don’t think I’m alone in saying that. You can go ahead and ask any sahm.
Well, I mean, there are a few who figured it out early on and are rocking that stay-at-home mom schedule. But the rest of us?
Yeah. No.
Life literally sucks if you cannot nail down your daily stay-at-home mom schedule.
I’ve been staying home now for seven years. 😆 I’ve learned a lot these past few years, but one thing that really makes a difference in my day – and whether or not it truly sucks – is my morning routine.
If you can nail down your stay-at-home mom morning routine, then you can hammer out the rest of your day pretty easily.
And then, life won’t suck anymore. 🤣 😂
Instead, you’ll feel productive, accomplished, and on top of things.
So, how do you nail down that stay-at-home mom morning routine?
After seven years, here’s what works best for me!
Before creating your stay-at-home mom schedule, determine your family values
The one thing you need to do, though, before you ever think about creating your morning routine – or your daily stay-at-home schedule, for that matter – is figure out what your values are, as a sahm.
It took me a couple of years to realize that. 🙄
You won’t be happy as a sahm at all, if you are running around, trying to do what everyone else says you should do.
For instance, I do not enjoy volunteering my time. I know, I know. It makes me sound like a horrible person.
But it’s not something I really like. So, when I had to squeeze in working concessions at my son’s basketball game, with three little guys in tow (because hubby wasn’t home and I had no babysitter), well, it made me stop and think.
Why?
Why am I killing myself trying to do something that I don’t enjoy, just because other people say I should do it?
To heck with other people!!
I stayed home to raise my babies. Not to serve other people.
So, before you figure out your daily stay-at-home mom schedule, spend some time figuring out what you value. If you like volunteering, and it is important to you, then great!! Fit that in there.
But if you don’t, let it go.
Now, I’m not saying never volunteer. 😆 I don’t like doing it, but I do think it is important. We should all help out once in a while.
But there’s a time and a season for that, and if it won’t work for you right now, don’t stress about it! Put it on the shelf for a while.
If your schedule is full of things that you love, and that you value as a mom, then you will love staying home.
It’s that simple.
Use time chunking to map out your stay-at-home mom schedule
After totally sucking at staying home, and venting to my hubby one night, he helped me to figure out the secret to happily staying home with my babies.
And it was incredibly obvious that I needed to chunk my day down.
See, kids can’t tell time. So, when you are setting up your daily schedule, it works best to use natural breaks in your day to run your schedule by – not the clock.
These natural breaks might be:
✔︎ breakfast
✔︎ morning naps
✔︎ lunch
✔︎ afternoon naps
✔︎ snack time
✔︎ supper
✔︎ bedtime
And then the natural thing to do would be to build a routine around each of these breaks in your day and then create little mini-routines in between.
This way, your kids will learn that they get to go outside when mom’s done with her morning chores. So, when they see you sweeping the kitchen floor, they know that their job is to play in the living room and that when you are done, it’s time to go outside.
It’s a great tool for managing behavior and for setting expectations for your kids.
That’s just one benefit of a daily sahm routine. There are tons more.
So, how do we create an awesome morning routine using time chunking?
How to create a morning routine for your stay-at-home mom schedule
(This post may contain affiliate links. This means I may offer a link to a product I think would help you with your morning routine. If you choose to purchase something from that link, Making Mommas gets a tiny commission. This helps to support the blog and costs you nothing extra. For more information, see my disclosure policy.)
Break your morning down into chunks. The chunks you use will depend on your own family values and the ages of your kids.
For instance, you might have a chunk of time set aside for just you, before the kids get up. Then you might chunk down the rest of your morning based on before breakfast, after breakfast, a morning nap, if you have a baby, maybe morning snack time, if you have wee little ones, and then lunch. 🤷🏻♀️
Before the kids get up
Some moms like to get up before the kids get up. I loved the idea of getting up before the boys, but I never quite made it that far. I used to hate myself for it, and constantly try to get up.
Only to not. And then feel like a failure.
Again, be true to yourself and who you are. My whole precipice for getting up early was to exercise. It’s just what we are ‘supposed to do’, right?
Not if we don’t value it. Or if we value sleep more. (Which I did!)
So, know your values, and you do you.
If you decide to get up before the kids do, you need to know what you are going to do with that time, and then you are going to have to deliberately do it.
Because it’s easy to get caught up in swiping through Facebook. And suddenly, your quiet time is gone and your kids are up.
But you also need to be completely aware of how much time you need for your morning activities, as well.
When I started freelancing, I really did start getting up before the boys. And that was tough. Because I’d get up just an hour earlier.
And I’d be in the zone, working hard, concentrating on what I was doing, and then cringe when they woke up. 😆
I’d be crabby that I didn’t “get much done” and that they “interrupted me” and it’d set a bad tone for the rest of the day.
So, if there’s something you need to set aside a lot of time for, then you may need to get up hours before your kids.
If you don’t have enough time for that, then do smaller tasks in the morning before they get up and save those big things for later in the day.
Here are some things many moms love doing in the morning before their kids get up:
♥︎ exercising
♥︎ reading
♥︎ reading the bible
♥︎ prayer
♥︎ journaling
♥︎ going for a walk
♥︎ planning the day
♥︎ just quietly sipping coffee
You could also use the time to sneak in a shower, clean the house, prep meals, get older kids ready for school, play with the dog, spend time with your hubby, work on a hobby or craft, or get some work done if you work from home.
When the kids get up
Your daily sahm routine starts when your kids get up. 😁 It’s go time!
Many people like to wake up and just ease into the day. Your kids are no different.
You know your family best, so set the morning activities based on what they like to do.
Our pre-breakfast routine consisted of snuggle time. We’d snuggle on the couch or the rocking chair, and just quietly rock or talk.
And that’s all we really did.
The boys got down off of my lap one by one, as they were ready, and toddled off to play. That was my signal that it was time to make breakfast.
As they got older, they liked to grab their kindles and watch something after snuggling with me for a bit.
Now, however, they are all in elementary school. So, on the weekends, they love to play their Xbox, watch YouTube videos, or read in the mornings. I have one who just recently got into drawing with Art Hub, so he spends his mornings quietly doing that.
I very rarely get morning snuggles anymore. So, when I do, it’s a treat!
Here are some other ideas for pre-breakfast routines:
- Reading, writing, or drawing
- Quiet videos
- Video games
- Board games
- Puzzles
- Prayers and bible study
When I worked in the preschool classroom, they did board games, puzzles, and writing as kids arrived. When I ran my own daycare, we watched movies quietly or read.
Breakfast
And just like that, it’s breakfast time!
You can do breakfast in a couple of different ways: serve something quick and easy or pull out all the stops for a good ol’ fashioned breakfast.
We do quick and easy on weekdays and big breakfasts on the weekends.
Because I’d be up and about, it would signal the end of the quiet time. So, the boys did more rambunctious activities, while I made breakfast.
This meant they often played in the living room next to the kitchen, while I prepared breakfast. They’d play cars, trains, or in their own toy kitchen. These were items I kept in the living room for playtime.
You can do that; keep some toys in a room right next to you, as long as you can still see and hear the kids. Or you can put them in the kitchen. It might be a good time to color or play with playdough at the table.
You can keep a stash of fun things for your kids to do during the breakfast hour that you use only for breakfast. That way, the toys are always fun, fresh, and new. They are special. And should occupy your child while you make breakfast.
If you have an infant or toddler, use a containment method, such as a bouncy chair or highchair, to keep them busy and out of harm’s way.
If you have a TV in the kitchen, that helps too. My boys would often sit and watch Daniel Tiger while I prepared breakfast.
And then eat at the table, together.
Typically, I do not allow electronics while we eat. But, when they were little, and the rest of the family was off at school and work, I would let them watch cartoons while we ate.
Breakfast dishes
I am a firm believer in immediate clean-up. So, once breakfast is done, I do the dishes. It just makes life easier.
The boys have been contained at the table for a while, so they are happy to get down and go play.
My kids had unstructured free play time while I did the dishes. This means they played what they wanted to play, without any adult interference or guidance.
They entertained themselves while I cleaned up.
It was something I taught them how to do from day one. Of course, when they are toddlers, they are often clingy and stick close to you. But it’s your job to teach them that they are okay and can play by themselves.
And when they are infants, you’ll still need to contain them in their containment units. 😁
After breakfast
There is a nice little chunk of time you can use for whatever you want to after breakfast. This is where your values come in.
And the ages of your children might come into play as well.
When the boys were little, I’d try to work as quickly as I could and get my morning chores done. My morning chores consist of: dishes, sweeping the floor, taking out the garbages, making the beds, vacuuming, getting the laundry going, and wiping down the bathrooms.
It’s a lot. And when the kids were little, I didn’t always get it all done.
I’d work until they could no longer handle playing on their own. You know your children and you know when they are kind of done with an activity. They start getting whiny and clingy and that is your signal to move on.
So, I’d get as much done as I could, and then we’d play together.
Depending on the season and the weather, this was inside or outside play. And it was either child-led or adult-led, meaning I’d play with the boys. Sometimes we’d play what they wanted to play, and sometimes I’d set up an activity or game and they’d follow my lead.
I highly value playing with my kids and spending time with them. In fact, it is my single most important sahm value, and why I wanted to be a sahm in the first place.
You may have different values.
Some other ideas for your morning schedule include:
- Homeschool time
- Bible study time
- Crafts and activities
- Reading and writing
- Singing and dancing
- Playing inside or outside
- Running errands
- Going to the park
- Taking “field trips”
Try to incorporate different types of play into your day; times that your kids play alone, times that they play with you. Times that you lead the activity, and times that you follow their “rules” and play their way.
Morning Naps
If you have babies or toddlers, they might still take a morning nap or have a morning snack. So, this is another great transition time, and a way to chunk your day down.
If you always end the play with a quick little snack, and then a book, or a calm song, your little one will start to associate all of those activities with getting sleepy. 😁 And it will make nap time so much easier.
That’s what we did when my boys were still tiny. We’d have a morning snack when we were done playing. And then we’d read a short story or two, and it was off to bed.
When they were babies, it was a bottle, rocking, and singing.
I call these activities my ‘bedtime rituals’.
That’s where you choose a few activities, and you do them in the same order, at roughly the same time, every day.
If your child needs a nap at 10:30, then you want to wind down playtime and get a snack rolling by 10:00.
Always be consistent with this.
Once the little one is asleep, you can get caught up on any housework you haven’t had time to do yet. Or, if you have older kids, you can use that time to spend with them, alone.
Big kids often get lost in the shuffle when you have a baby. So, I always tried to spend some one-on-one time with big brother while the little one was asleep.
Late morning routine
Usually, morning naps are short little cat naps. So, after nap time, there’s still morning left!
What you do with this time is again up to you. It’ll all depend on your values.
As you might guess, my boys and I played again.
We always tried to get outside in the morning if we could.
If we couldn’t, this made for a good craft time or some other fun activity.
Here’s a few ideas to fill up your stay-at-home mom schedule:
- Craft or coloring time
- Play dough, Legos, or Marble Racers
- Paint
- Homeschooling time
- Outside play
- Field trips or errands
- Creative play or make-believe
- Board games or puzzles
- Dance or other movement play
The mornings at the preschool were used for some quiet board games and puzzles, instructive learning, crafts, and reading. I’m guessing that this is because most kids probably learn best in the morning when their minds are fresh and they are full of energy.
So you may want to tackle the activities that require more focus in the morning, such as homeschooling, puzzles, crafts, and games.
And then, right before lunch, things would get a little more rambunctious, with what they called “boost-up”.
Boost-up was really just a bunch of coordinated physical activity, such as walking, dancing, etc., to certain songs (Jim Gill is great), crossing the overhead ladder, or jumping on an indoor trampoline while saying your ABCs or identifying shapes.
We did the same sorts of things when I ran a daycare: started the day out quiet, then moved to more focused activities, then wrapped the morning up with movement.
Ending the morning with lunch
It goes without saying that your morning routine ends at lunchtime! 🤣😂
I would prepare lunch the same way I would breakfast: the kids had free time while I got lunch ready.
I always kept lunch to very child-specific meals. Meaning, it was kid food that they would like. 😆 (My suppers aren’t always.)
And I always tried to serve a main entre, such as mac & cheese, chicken nuggets, or tomato soup and grilled cheese, with a fruit and/or veggie, a bread, and milk.
So, we might have mac & cheese and a sandwich or a hot dog, with grapes and milk. Or, chicken nuggets, potato chips, apple slices, and milk.
I usually focused on finger foods (easier to feed the twins if they could feed themselves) and kept it simple.
I used to play silly kid music for them while we ate because the twins couldn’t talk yet, and my little Toots and I would run out of things to say. 😆 So, it helped us all to stay connected while we ate.
When the twins got older, we turned it off. Now we just talk during lunch.
At the end of the day…
Well, at the end of the morning, actually…. 😁
Establishing a stay-at-home mom schedule will make your day better. It will help you to feel more productive during the day, and it will help you to manage your child’s behavior better.
Kids crave structure and routine. It is important for their identity, self-control, and emotion regulation. There are so many benefits to creating a consistent stay-at-home mom schedule.
The easiest way to create an awesome stay-at-home mom schedule is to set yourself up like a daycare and chunk that day down.
More on Sahm Schedules
Rockin’ the Sahm Life: Why You Need a Great Stay-At-Home Mom Schedule
3 Quick Ways to the Perfect Stay-at-Home Mom Routine
Wanna Create the Best Ever Stay at Home Mom Schedule? Here’s How!
How to Create a Daily SAHM Routine Using Time Chunking
How to Create Easy After-School Routines Your Kids Will (Almost!) Love
