Our New Morning Routine

This is a sponsored conversation written by me for compensation by Bayer. The opinions and text are all mine.

Now that we are over a month into our new school routine, I feel confident enough to share allllll the changes and how I’ve been managing our mornings. In case you missed our news, Austin started a new job this summer in which he has to leave at 4:30am — so I’m riding solo for morning duty. Flora also started preschool MWF mornings and Piper started going to school M-F (her school is 30 mins from our house). So, it was a lot of changes all at once. To be completely honest it’s been a brutal adjustment for me in so many ways, but I finally feel like I’m in a good groove!

One of the things that’s taken priority with my new routine is taking a little better care of myself and my family– taking daily vitamins, making green smoothies in the mornings and getting MORE sleep with earlier bedtimes. Austin has taken Bayer One A Day^Æ Men’s vitamins for years and I recently started taking the One A Day^Æ Women’s VitaCraves^{Æ .}

But back to the routine! I’ve talked on Instagram about how getting up before my girls at 5am was extremely helpful in starting my day- but after a few weeks I realized if I do not fall asleep by 10pm this just is not feasible. So instead I get up by 6 every day and then aim to be up by 5:15 a few days a week – usually every other day. It still gives me some morning alone time but I’m not as exhausted!

So, I wake up, make my coffee and usually sit in silence on my laptop in the living room for about 20 minutes (I fear the TV will wake up the girls)!! By 6am I like to be getting ready in my room – washing my face, putting on makeup and running a curling iron through my hair. I’ve also made the big change of getting dressed in a cute outfit M-F. It has been the best for my productivity and mood! Usually one of the girls will wake up while I’m getting ready but sometimes I make it through!

As soon as the girls wake up, they get dressed and I find this saves us a lot of time. We pick out Piper’s clothes for the week on Sunday and put them in her DIY clothes organizer, this has been a GAME CHANGER!! And then I try to set Flora’s out the night before and get her dressed as soon as I change her morning diaper when she wakes so everyone is basically ready for the day.

The girls like to eat as soon as they get up, so I make breakfast for us all – usually a frozen waffle for Flora & I, some sort of bar for Piper, mini muffins, smoothies and fruit. Sometimes I eat then but most days I eat in the car. While the girls are eating, I load up the backpacks with lunches (made the night before) and water bottles and set them by the door. This is also when we take our vitamins. I worry so much that we are all getting vitamins and minerals we may need but feel a lot less guilty knowing that Bayer One A Day Vitamins can help fill the nutrient gaps. You can get One A Day Vitamins in the vitamin aisle at Walmart and they are also available with online grocery pickup & delivery services.

After the girls eat and brush their teeth it’s time for some hair styling :) Putting together a hair caddy to keep ALL the hair stuff in one place has made this go by much quicker!

And then we may or may not have 10-15 minutes to play before it’s time to go. We have a no-screen time before school rule in our house but occasionally I will break it if I need to get something done. I fill up my to-go cup with my second cup of coffee, grab my breakfast and pile everyone into the car, I like to be walking out of the door by 7:20!

Images by Lauren Swann & Olivia Reed Photo