5 Routines Keeping Me Sane as a New Mom
Keep reading this post to learn:
⋒ What routines really are and a simple mindset shift you can make around them
⋒ 5 routines that I have found support myself and my family the best this season
⋒ How you can create and establish routines for yourself, no matter what season you are in
As most of you know, I’m a new mama – my sweet girl Everly just turned 5 months old and these are routines that are supporting us right now. Honestly, these routines have been supportive pretty much the whole time I’ve been a mom but how I live the routines out has varied a little as she grows and changes.
That is something that I want to note before I get into the routines themselves. Y’all know I always say that our schedules and routines are tools, not chains – I also believe that our intentions behind our routines, or why we are doing the routines, is just as important, if not more important than the actual tasks that make up the routines themselves.
Routines get the reputation of stifling creativity or flexibility when in reality, when you’re implementing routines that make sense for the season of life you’re in, they actually streamline things so you don’t have to use as much brainpower to get things done – they create more margin in your life by taking the guesswork out of how you're going to get things done, how you're going to make sure to take care of yourself, and how you’re going to show up for your priorities. Routines actually give you more freedom because of the margin they create. They free up your time and energy which means you can spend that saved time and energy on whatever you want – like self-care practices, hanging out with your family, or pursuing a goal or hobby.
Okay, let’s get into the 5 routines keeping me sane as a new mom:
#1: Simple Menu-Style Morning/Evening Routines
I teach about menu-style routines in the Hustle Sanely Kickstart Course and they are a big hit with my type B people because of the variety and flexibility they provide. They’re also really helpful when your time is unpredictable (aka like when you have a newborn, lol).
A menu-style routine just means instead of having a routine that is precisely scheduled out (so like at 6 AM I wake up and drink water + take my vitamins, at 6:15 I walk the dog, at 6:45 I journal, at 6:55 I meditate, etc.) you have a rough start time and a rough end time for your routine but what you’re doing in that timeframe varies from day to day. I have my non-negotiables every morning and evening and then I fill in the gaps by choosing things from my menus based on how I’m feeling, how much energy I have, and how much time I have.
I like to have a morning and evening routine menu so that I have something to “order from” or choose from. When I have the menu idea in mind, it reminds me that I don’t have to do it all. I just choose 1 or a few things from it – like how you order from a menu when you go out to eat!
Here’s what my menus look like in this season:
MORNING MENU:
~ Reading personal development
~ Going on a walk
~ Reading the Bible
~ Doing my tidy for 15 (I do this every day but sometimes it happens in the morning before Everly wakes up but sometimes it waits til I get home from the gym – just depends on what time she wakes up)
EVENING MENU:
~ Taking a book bath
~ Watching a show or playing a game with Adam
~ Spending time with a friend
~ Stretching/Core work
And because I know the Hustle Sanely Squad loves a real-life example, I’ll go ahead and share my non-negotiables, too:
MORNING NON-NEGOTIABLES:
~ Taking my supplements and drinking a glass of water
~ Skincare
~ Journaling
EVENING NON-NEGOTIABLES:
~ Skincare
~ Journaling
~ Evening reset (more on this shortly)
As long as I’m doing those things, then I’m good. Like I said, I’m less focused on perfectly doing certain tasks every day and more focused on how I feel during and after the routine.
Before becoming a mom, my morning and evening routines were more elaborate and they looked pretty much the same day-to-day because that’s what felt good and supported me in that season of my life. But those elaborate, look the same almost everyday routines don’t really fit into my life that well anymore.
I never really know what time Everly is going to wake up or what time she is going to fall asleep so instead of having these elaborate routines that I feel like I have to hurry up and get through, I’ve really leaned out my morning and evening routines so that that are doable in this season of motherhood. Having 3 non-negotiables for each one has been really great for me. Being flexible is one skill that I’ve really embraced as a new mom and leaning out my morning and evening routines has been really helpful.
Knowing my non-negotiables helps me keep my routines simple – I’m not trying to cram everything in – I know everything on the menu is an “If I can today, great. If I can’t today, great.” After my non-negotiables, sometimes I’ll do 2-3 items from my menus but sometimes I do none. Just depends on how the morning and evening go with Everly.
#2: Evening Reset Routine
This has been a game changer for me as a new mom and it takes 10ish minutes total. This is one of those routines that is present me looking out for future me.
My Evening Rest Routine looks like this:
👉🏼 The nights that Adam isn’t working, he gives Everly a bath – while he is doing that, I go into her room and wipe down her play mat and her changing table. I restock her wipes and diapers if they need to be and take out the diaper pail if it’s full. I also get her diffuser going for the night – I diffuse Seedlings Calm by Young Living in her room at bedtime. If Adam is working and I am doing bath time, I just have Everly in her bouncer in her room while I do these things then I give her a bath.
Now that she sleeps in her own room, I like that stuff to be done before she gets out of the bath because we are VERY BIG on her bedtime routine (I really think it’s why she’s been sleeping through the night since she was 8 weeks old) and I want her room to be peaceful and good to go when we bring her in there to put on her PJs, eat her last bottle, and read a bedtime story.
👉🏼 After we or I get Everly to sleep (usually between 7:15/7:30), I go into the kitchen and reset her bottle area.
I clean all the bottles from the day (we have a little container that sits in one side of our sink where we put used bottles throughout the day). Then I refill the Baby Breeza’s (it’s basically like a Keurig for bottles) water reservoir, add in more formula, and clean the little spout thing.
👉🏼 Lastly, I go into her bathroom and just wipe down the tub and put her bath stuff under the sink.
Like I said, it takes me around 10 minutes to do all of this stuff (maybe 12 if I have to do the diaper pail) but it saves me SO much mental stress the next morning. I am always so grateful to wake up with everything ready to go for the day and it really does make my mornings more peaceful!
Plus, if Adam is working, I’ll put on my headphones and listen to a podcast or something while I do it so it goes by so fast! Now that it’s a routine, I don’t even have to think about the tasks, I just do them – they’re built into my life and like I said, doing them makes my life a lot easier the next day and that’s worth the 10 minutes of time every evening to me.
#3: Standing Weekly Date Night
Adam and I quickly figured out that as new parents, it can be really easy to let your relationship with your partner fall by the wayside. We have to be very intentional about prioritizing each other because it doesn’t just naturally happen like it used to. We’ve always done a weekly date but we never had a standing day that we did it – we kinda would just do it whenever we wanted. We kept trying to do it that way after Everly was born but honestly, it just kept getting swept to the side because we’d be focusing on other things or we’d be so tired that we’d just pass out at the end of every day.
So a few months ago, we decided to deem Sunday as our weekly date day and it has been so amazing! It’s held us accountable – we can count on a date happening every single Sunday. We don’t have to think about it when or if it’s going to happen or wonder when the last time we went on a date was.
Here’s what we do: every other Sunday, my parents come over and watch Everly (we are super blessed to have that support – and incredibly grateful for it) so Adam and I get to do a date outside of the house – we’ll go paddleboarding, biking, go to dinner, a few weeks ago we went to see Wicked – just whatever we’re in the mood to do!
And then on the other Sundays in between those, after we get Everly to bed, we cook dinner (aka Adam cooks dinner, lol I don’t cook), eat together, and usually sit outside and sip on some wine while we chat and spend time together.
This standing weekly date night has really helped Adam and I keep our relationship strong which makes us better people and parents! Maybe there will be a season when we go back to random dates but for now, this works well for us.
#4: Doing a load of laundry daily
Wanna know what I didn’t expect? A little, tiny human accumulating so much dirty laundry in a single day. Seriously, on any given day, Everly’s hamper has 5 burp cloths, a bib, PJs, 2-3 outfits because ya know blowouts and spit up a bath towel – and that’s just from one day!
Before having a baby, I probably did laundry 2-3 times a week. I’ve never been a “laundry day” person – as in I’ve never liked having one day where I do like 8 loads of laundry because that sounds terrible to me. The thought of washing, folding, and putting away all of that throughout one day feels overwhelming to me. So when I first became a mom, I was still sticking to my 2-3 times a week laundry routine (I didn’t have certain days – just whenever I noticed the hampers being ⅓-½ way full I’d do laundry that day). I quickly learned that it felt overwhelming to me because of how much more laundry we had now.
So I started doing a load of laundry every single day – which I know sounds intense but I promise it’s not – at least not to me. I’d way rather spend 10 minutes a day doing a load of laundry than an entire day working my way through a mountain of it.
When I get home from the gym in the morning, I gather all the dirty clothes and put them in the washer. I go take my shower and get ready for the day. By the time I’m done with that, the clothes are ready to be moved over to the dryer. Then when Adam is cooking dinner, I usually fold the laundry. Or sometimes, if work isn’t super full, I’ll do it when I pause to eat lunch.
It never feels like a big deal or a burden because as I said, it takes me 10 minutes or less to do it since the loads are so small. It feels manageable whereas having one big laundry day just doesn’t.
I think that’s a big thing to pay attention to as a new mom – what feels manageable to you? How can you do things in a way that doesn’t feel big or daunting or overwhelming? Because how you used to do things, pre-mom life, might not feel good anymore. And that’s okay. Instead of getting frustrated with yourself, figure out what feels supportive to you now.
#5: Daily time blocking for work
This is a work routine, not a life routine, but I feel like it’s worth sharing because I feel like whether you’re a stay-at-home mom or a working mom, you could take a little nugget away from this one.
I’ve shared this on the podcast and on Instagram but since having Everly, I’ve cut my work week down to 3 days – I currently work Tuesday-Thursday from 10:30-4ish. Before I was a mom, I was working 5 days a week and I was using a pretty structured weekly batching schedule to run my business and it was awesome. So basically, each day of the week had a focus and I’d do work that fell into that focus on that day.
Monday was product development day
Tuesday was content creation day
Wednesday was product development day
Thursday was calls and coaching day
Friday was open loop day
When I was working 5 days a week, this worked so well! Now that I’m working 3 days a week – it doesn’t really feel as good to structure my work week this way. I tried to keep to a weekly batch schedule for work in March and the first part of April – but only having 3 days made me feel like I was trying to cram too much into each day. I was finding that if I didn’t get all of my “product development” tasks done by the end of Tuesday that I would feel stressed because I knew I didn’t have time to focus on that built into my schedule again until the following Tuesday.
So since mid-April I’ve been trying a different approach and so far, it feels really good! I’ve been leaning more into a time-blocking approach combined with batching. Let me explain:
I still use batching because I schedule all of my calls and coaching on Wednesdays. I prefer to batch those because I don’t feel like I can get good quality work done if I’m constantly having to pause to get on calls. I also batch my podcast by the month so I dedicate one week a month to getting the podcast episodes for the following month written and recorded.
And here is how time-blocking comes into play – I assign certain tasks to certain blocks of time every workday. Whereas before, I’d have a focus for each day but I’d kinda just bop around and do things as I wanted to within the day because I was working more days and hours so I had that flexibility. Now, I have to get things done efficiently because I’m only working 3 days.
I know y’all love a concrete example so here is what my time-blocked work days look like right now:
Tuesdays:
11:00-1:00 — Focus 3/Deep work
1:30-2:00 — CEO Tasks
2:30-3:30 — Focus 3/Deep work
4:00-4:30 — Make IG posts
Wednesdays:
11:00-1:30 — Calls
2:00-2:30 — CEO Tasks
3:00-5:00 — Coaching
Thursdays:
10:00-12:00 — Focus 3/Deep work
12:30-1:30 — Planning + Content Check
1:45-2:15 — CEO Tasks
2:30-3:30 — Make IG posts
Like I said – this is working well in this season but it might change next month. Our schedules and routines are tools, not chains and I’m always just trying to do what works best for me in each season without getting frustrated that I have to pivot.
And if you’re like ummm this sounds amazing, I need to learn more about time-blocking and batching – go check out the Peacefully Productive Schedule course – there is a whole module in there where I teach you my favorite time management strategies and these are in there!
AND I have a bonus 6th routine that is supporting me as a new mama:
Did you really think I’d let you go without raving about Hustle Sanely 5???
I didn’t want to use it as one of the 5 because I wanted to give you some insight into other routines that I use because I talk about HS5 all the time but the 5 habits that make up HS5 have been crucial for me since Everly was born.
Here’s a quick HS5 refresher if you need it:
1. Complete your Focus 3.
2. Move for 30 minutes.
3. Tidy for 15 minutes.
4. Say or do one kind thing for yourself.
5. Say or do one kind thing for someone else.
I even used HS5 to support me when we spent the first week of her life in the NICU – those 5 daily habits helped me to make sure I was taking care of myself, mentally + physically, and not spreading myself too thin postpartum. HS5 gave me some solid ground to stand on – something that was consistent and that I could count on – when everything else around me felt very out of control (being in the NICU felt like a weird twilight zone, seriously).
So if you’re a mama and you’re not doing Hustle Sanely 5 – you are missing out, for real! These 5 daily habits will help you make progress on things that are important to you while you prioritize your mental and physical health and nurture the important relationships in your life! Check out this blog post to learn all about HS5!
If you’re feeling overwhelmed as new mom and you don’t know where to start with routines, my best piece of advice is to pay attention to what parts of your day feel clunky or chaotic or really stress you out.
Ask yourself:
“What about this stresses me out?”
“What can I do to make this part of my day or life smoother?”
Bam that’s your routine! Don’t overthink it – keep it simple, especially in this season. You are the boss of your routines and they don’t have to look like anyone else’s – they are meant to support you, not stress you out!
Ready to start implementing better routines in your life?
Check out our Hustle Sanely Kickstart Program!
Loved this blog post? Tune into the full podcast episode below!
