Are your mornings rushed and crazy? Here are 8 ways you can improve your mornings—and even enjoy them!

Mornings ask a lot of us. They gather tired people, demand they dress, eat, pack bags, prepare for the day, load up into cars and buses, and get somewhere in a timely fashion. Did I mention the tired part?

This is the time of day when we are at our worst (or maybe second-worst, depending on how bad bedtime can get). The demands of the day press on us when we are still not awake enough to process and compartmentalize them.

So, how do we take this daily routine that often devolves into raised voices and frantic movement through the house and make it better?

I love mornings—in theory. Often, the reality is nowhere near my expectations. But with a chance to do it over again each day, change and tweak the things that aren’t working, I’ve found some tricks that have really made our mornings better.

Here are 8 ways you can improve your mornings and enjoy them more…

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Prepare breakfast and lunch the night before

If you’ve ever forgotten a lunch or burnt oatmeal on the stove because you were changing a diaper instead of stirring, you know what a problem point this can be.

Instead of making a stressful time of day even worse, prep your morning meals the night before.

Make pancake batter (or even cook the pancakes) that night, and the next morning requires minimum effort. Pour cereal into everyone’s bowls, so they just have to add milk. Prep lunches and put them in the fridge for a quick grab before leaving the house.

Check out this post for ideas on make-ahead breakfasts that will improve your morning madness.

Wake up first

Whether it’s an alarm or a child, be up before the racket starts. It doesn’t have to be a lot earlier, which we all know is difficult with an early work schedule or early-rising baby. Even 5 minutes will make a difference in your morning.

Kat Lee always espouses in her Hello Mornings book, podcasts, and writings that we should wake up for our lives, not to our lives. Don’t open your eyes and jump right in. Start at a speed that works for you, so you’re ready for the day.

Hence, getting up first. Take 5-10 minutes to drink some water, read a devotion or book you’re into, stretch, brush your teeth, or start the coffee. Wake up your kids with a hug, kiss your husband good morning, and start getting ready without the rush.

Improving your mornings is as much mental as it is physical.

Incentivize your morning

Give yourself something to look forward to. This way, when the alarm rings and you think about hitting the snooze, you remember that there’s something good waiting for you outside of that bed.

Set your coffeemaker so a hot brew awaits you. Get in an invigorating workout. Read your favorite book for a little while. Watch the sun rise or take a walk around the neighborhood. Make your favorite breakfast.

When you have something besides a hectic morning to look forward to, you’re more likely to get out of bed on time, or even early.

Force the issue

Sometimes we need more than a reward. Sometimes we need to have a deadline on that reward.

My front window faces the southeast, and I love the rays of sunshine that come through when the sun first rises. But between the trees and other houses, that direct sunlight is soon obscured. If I don’t get up in time, I’ll miss it.

Does the coffee get cold in the pot if you don’t drink it soon enough? Set the coffeemaker a little earlier to push you out of bed.

Do you like hitting the gym when it’s empty? Let that preference get you out of bed on cold mornings when sleeping in will mean waiting on machines.

Set out the day’s clothes the night before

Have you ever stood in your closet, going from outfit to outfit, even as you make yourself later and later? Have you ever had a child say they can’t find such-and such shirt they want to wear, or your husband wants to know where his blue tie is?

Clothes can suck up way too much time in the mornings. The best way to avoid clothing disasters on busy mornings is to set them out the night before.

Have your children set up their outfits for the week, down to socks and underwear, so there are no mishaps when they wake up. Check the forecast to make sure they are dressed right for the weather.

Set your own outfits up, too. Try them on to make sure there is no morning-of angst over how a pair of pants fit or how a shirt looks.

Having everyone get dressed without drama will radically improve your mornings and reduce stress.

Build margin into your mornings

Things will happen. We snooze one too many times. Breakfast burns. We need to get gas. There’s horrible traffic.

Build a cushion into your morning routine to allow for these occurrences so that your entire morning isn’t derailed because of forgotten homework that needs to be retrieved.

Some people try to trick themselves by setting their clocks ahead (tried it) or pretending they had to be somewhere 30 minutes before they actually did (tried it). But I found the best thing to do is time-block my mornings.

Time blocking is basically setting aside a certain time for a certain task. The trick is to allow buffers between them and be realistic. Don’t think you can make a 20-minute drive in 10 or 15. Don’t back-to-back tasks like “workout” and “breakfast” if you have to change before you turn on the stove (those minutes matter).

Allowing extra time keeps you from over-packing your mornings and running late when the unexpected occurs.

Wake up gently

If waking up is an ordeal (for you or another family member), with you slapping off your alarm the moment it starts and then sleeping longer than you’d like, consider a gentler wake up.

Try apps like Sleep Cycle, which offers an alarm within a 30-minute window and tracks your sleep cycle so that it’s the best time for you to be woken up.

Put your alarm or phone across the room so that it is far enough that you need to get up to turn it off. Plus, it’s not startling you by being next to your head.

Or you can even try specialty alarm clocks that move away from you as you try to turn them off. (Seriously. To each their own.)

If you have an eastward facing window in your bedroom, maybe open the blinds before going to sleep and let the gradual sunrise wake you.

Waking up more gently will improve your mornings and also your mentality.

Set up a To-Go Station

Putting together a to-go station by our garage door, the last part of the house we are in before heading to the car, was super helpful to our mornings.

With a shoe rack, hooks for jackets and backpacks, a shelf for books or my coffee, and a place for my purse and keys, our to-go station made it possible to remember everything we needed when we left the house.

Of course, we do sometimes forget things. Books need to be brought out of bedrooms to make it into the library bag. Lunches need to be packed into backpacks to make it out the door.

But overall, having a place to keep the things we need to leave the house each morning in one place has really made our mornings less crazy and more organized.

I hope these tips and tricks for improving your mornings will help you have a more enjoyable start to your day. Because how we start shapes how the entire rest of our day goes.

 

What tricks do you use to improve your mornings? What’s worked for you and what hasn’t? I’d love to hear in the comments!

 

Interested in other ways to better manage your time? Check out these posts:

5 Freezable Breakfasts That Will De-Stress Your Mornings

How to Find Your Peak Productivity Time

The Top 10 Productivity Apps that Every Homemaker Needs

 

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