How to Create a Stay At Home Mom Routine That Works
Moms have one of the most important jobs in the world, raising little people! Being a stay-at-mom, like any job, takes preparation, organization, skills, and the right mindset to make it enjoyable and productive as a vocation. Let’s talk about setting routines that actually work for stay-at-home moms.
Whether you’ve always wanted to be a stay-at-home mom or discovered your calling to the home after becoming a mother, this post is for you. Because many of you probably fall into both categories – I know I do.
Why does motherhood seem so difficult these days?
The short answer – mothering is instinctual, yes. But it is also a skillset. Mothering requires skills. Skills require knowledge and practice over time to master. And most new mothers today simply do not have these skills. But it’s not really their fault…and many times they don’t even realize they were deprived of learning these skills so they end up wondering: what’s wrong with me?
I’ve been there! Let’s discuss where things went wrong.
Like most girls raised in the past hundred years, there wasn’t much talk about marriage or motherhood when talking about preparing for a future as an adult. Girls were treated just like the boys at school where I spent most of my waking hours – thus, planning for the future meant focusing 100% on a career.
Most of us come from 2-3 child families and by the time we start having babies of our own, it’s been 20+ years since we have been around a baby. Many new moms have never changed a diaper, never seen another mom nurse a baby, and are totally clueless.
Historically speaking, this is very unnatural. For all of history before the standardization of small families in the 1930’s, large families were the norm. There were babies everywhere. It was commonplace to see a mother in her 40s carrying her last baby alongside her oldest daughter carrying her first. There was a never-ending flow of new babies into the family, the church, and the home. So, newly married women expecting their first baby would have had plenty of experience and no shortage of a village of wise, older mothers to offer a helping hand and advice.
How do we make up for lost time and experience?
Will we ever get back to large families and the village as the standard? Who knows. But in the meantime, most of us mothers are on our own. Most do not have much help, let alone a village. This certainly makes things more challenging – and can definitely make motherhood feel isolating. But, that doesn’t mean mothers today can’t thrive and make a peaceful home that is full of joy and beauty. Trust me, it can be done – I’ve seen it in the lives of friends who are further along in their journey and in my own life as I learn and reclaim lost wisdom from mothers of the past.
We won’t be solving all the world’s motherhood and family dynamic problems today. In fact, attempting to solve too many problems at once can lead to paralysis and overwhelm – leaving you more discouraged than before you started. The first step to bringing order to your home and your days, whether you’re a new mom or mom of many, lies in the daily schedule.
Now, I know what you’re thinking – are we really going to be making a spreadsheet and planning down to the minute? Well, you certainly can if that suits you. But that’s not exactly the kind of time management I’m talking about when I say daily schedule…
1. Structure Your Days
You don’t need to be militaristic. After all, one of the benefits of staying home is that it’s a friendlier place to women since it does allow for flexibility and rest in seasons of illness, pregnancy, postpartum, etc. However, the home should not be a free-for-all zoo with no rhythms or routines.
Morning Routine
Wake up before the kids, make your bed, get dressed, get some daily chores going, and make sure all 3 meals for the day are planned. Get breakfast going as soon as possible. We all know it’s easier to prepare a meal before everyone is starving and having meltdowns.
I spent the first several years of motherhood sleeping in until the kids woke me up – which was still pretty early since little ones tend to be early risers. But the fact that they woke up first meant that I woke up on edge to hungry babies who needed to be dressed and fed, and I needed to get dressed and eat too. I felt like our mornings were pure chaos (because they were). I was crabby and playing catch-up all day long.
Even if you’re not a morning person – waking at least a half hour before you expect the first kids to wake will change the tone of your day entirely. You have time to pray, get dressed, make your bed, brush your teeth and get ready for the day, throw in a load of laundry, make sure everything is on hand and thawed for meals for the day, start breakfast, and even have enough time for some bible study or reading over a cup of coffee if no one is awake yet.
Once I started waking up early, I couldn’t believe what a difference it made and I’ve been hooked since! In fact, I usually get up at least an hour before the kids now to get a jump start on household chores and mostly to enjoy the peace and quiet of early mornings over coffee or tea before the day starts.
“She rises while it is yet night and provides food for her household and portions for her maidens.” Proverbs 31:15
?Now, most of us do not have maidens or hired help, but we have mouths to feed nonetheless and can join in the early morning work of the noble lady of Proverbs 31 by rising early to do so.
Daily Life
Your days are going to look drastically different from other moms depending on how many children you have, their ages, your lifestyle, and whether or not there are any special needs. But no matter what, there needs to be some structure and rhythm to your days. A free-for-all isn’t good for anyone.
Time blocking is an incredibly effective way to maintain a stay-at-home mom schedule that keeps everyone on track without being rigid or stressful. And the time block method can be done well no matter what stage of motherhood you are in.
Sample baby/toddler schedule with time-blocking
- Early morning – wake up half an hour before the kids and complete morning routine
- Breakfast
- Morning free play for an hour or two
- Go for a walk, to the gym, or the park for an hour or run any errands you need to run like going to the grocery store
- Lunch
- Nap time (prep dinner while the little ones nap, or get in some rest time with them if you need it)
- Afternoon snack
- Afternoon free time or play dates
- Quick tidy of the main area of the house before Dad gets home
- Once Dad is home, dinner should be prepped or at least planned, and you can enjoy quality time as a family before dinner.
- Dinner
- Bath time & pajamas
- Evening playtime, storytime
- Brush teeth & go to bed early enough so that Mom and Dad still have an hour or two together.
Sample schedule with young children of various ages
- Early morning – wake up half an hour before the kids and complete morning routine
- Breakfast, prayers, & bible study/story
- Babies and toddlers play, older kids work on school work or educational activities
- Go for a walk, to the gym, or park
- Lunch
- Nap time for littles, quiet time for non-nappers, this is a great time to do read-alouds with non-nappers
- Afternoon Snack
- Afternoon free time for everyone
- Quick tidy of the main area of the house before Dad gets home
- Once Dad is home, dinner should be prepped or at least planned. Then you can enjoy quality time as a family before dinner.
- Dinner
- Bath time & pajamas for babies & toddlers
- Evening playtime, storytime, babies and toddlers in bed first
- Big kids ready for bed at a decent hour so mom and dad can spend some time together
Bedtime Routine
This will vary depending on the ages of your children. But no matter what, it’s good to have a bedtime routine.
When you have all little ones, this can start pretty early with bathtime and putting pajamas on. When I had only littles – we did this right after dinner. They were usually covered in food anyway so one of us cleaned up the table while the other got the bath going and put the babies in the tub.
I think Americans use way too much soap and can be overly obsessed with hygiene, so I didn’t even put soap in the tub most nights. We did a nightly bath more for the routine and therapeutic effects of water on little ones than anything. It seemed to really help them sleep when they got to play in the tub as long as they wanted before bed! After baths and pajamas, we would brush their teeth and then spend some family time playing or reading – then it was bedtime.
As kids get older, the routine changes. They aren’t tired as early and (hopefully) aren’t covered in food after dinner every night. But it’s still good for them to have a routine. Part of this routine is helping out with evening chores. After dinner, our big kids clear the table, help finish dishes, and put them all away so the kitchen is tidied. Then they help with any laundry that didn’t get finished earlier in the day, tidy the living room, get pajamas on, and get ready for bed, and then we have our family time.
In the middle of big kids’ evening chores, I step away to put little ones to sleep and then join them for family time after. It’s still important for big kids to get to bed at a decent hour. We bought each of our big kids a red light reading light to clip to their books so they can stay up for a while and read if they like. But mom and dad still need to spend some time together too so bedtime, or at least lights out time, is a permanent rule for anyone young enough to be living under our roof. At least on school nights…
Having said this, it’s good to be flexible, especially if your lifestyle demands it. For example, we live on a farm and it doesn’t even get dark until nearly 9 pm in the summer – so bedtime is later and our evening routine looks a bit different since we are working outside until the sun goes down. There will be seasons of life where things just look different, and that’s ok.
2. Make A Daily To-Do List
This is so important! Make a to-do list of daily tasks that must be done every day, then stay on top of it. When you start each day with a plan and stick to it, there are plenty of little moments for rest throughout the day and things just go so much smoother. Part of enjoying a flexible schedule with time blocking is making sure you are moving the needle as a working mom – and yes, stay-at-home moms are working moms – the work of making a home never ends!
A 2011 study showed that unfinished tasks can actually cause intrusive thoughts and further prevent one from being productive. Writing down what you need to get done unburdens the brain and leads you to be more productive.
I use this daily to-do list notepad from Amazon that is under $7 and it’s absolutely perfect for making sure I get the most important things done every day and even has a space to jot down notes for priorities for the next day.
Using a pre-made to-do list notepad also prevents you from adding too many tasks to your list. It’s better to focus on the essentials than to get distracted with a million little things that could wait for another day. Plus, each task crossed off brings such satisfaction, and a fully completed list at the end of the day truly does make you feel better.
I recommend keeping a daily to-do list in addition to a paper planner because many who are not particularly type A have a hard time sticking to a planner, but the to-do list is easy and doesn’t require thinking too far in advance – you can just take it one day at a time.
3. Stay Physically Active
It’s no secret that we are in a health crisis in this country. A sedentary lifestyle is one huge culprit. And before you say, yes but I chase babies around all day! Listen, I get it, I do too. But modern technology has just made our lives so easy that even on our busiest days, we are not as active as our ancestors. We don’t have to carry heavy pails of water long distances, wash clothes by hand, walk several miles a day, and or do countless chores that require lots of elbow grease an heavy lifting – we have machines that do everything for us. And I’m not complaining! I’m just pointing out that we have to go out of our way to get adequate exercise every day.
What I’m suggesting here is that rather than making exercise seem like just another to-do on your daily list, you consider making it a fun and productive part of your daily stay-at-home mom routine. So many birds can be killed with this one stone if you’re willing to commit – active time, social time, outdoor time, mental break time, killing time when days seem to drag on forever…depending on what you choose you’ll check off at least a few of those things.
Find something you enjoy and can include the kids in, then make it part of your daily routine. Join a family gym, go on long walks, ride bikes, go to parks – there are lots of options, just pick something you’ll stick to. If you hate exercising in a gym, then joining a family gym is not a good choice because you’re probably not going to stick to it. Maybe you prefer being outdoors – great! Commit to spending an hour a day outside walking or exploring with the kids. It doesn’t matter what other moms on social media like or what the neighbor mom is doing – you need to pick something that works for your family and that you enjoy.
I accidentally got in the best shape of my life when my big kids were little because going to the local family gym was just an essential part of our routine. They (and I) counted on it so much every day that we rarely missed going, it was great! Now that I have big kids and little kids, we still go to the gym – but only 2-3 days a week as our school schedule allows – and we go to a community gym that has something for the entire family. I lift weights, the big kids play pickleball, and the little kids get to play with friends in the childcare area – it’s a win all around!
4. Learn New Skills
Odds are, you didn’t grow up with Ma Ingalls as a mentor. That’s ok, you’re not alone – far from it. You can learn a ton on the internet though, that’s where I’ve learned almost everything about homemaking, homesteading, and motherhood. Just don’t try to learn it all at once. Pick a new skill, master it, and then pick another one. Ex: bake bread, sew, mend, become a classical educator, study home decor, study art and classical music, start a home-based business, etc.
The list of skills a stay-at-home mom can learn and master is endless! Rather than spending free time on screen time and mindless scrolling, set aside some time every day to work on a skill. If you learn and master one new skill a month, by the end of the year that will be 12 new skills – that’s a lot! If you make a habit of learning and mastering new skills throughout your life in the home – you will have hundreds of valuable skills and probably lots of wisdom to bless your family with and hand down to your children and grandchildren.
It never ceases to amaze me when I hear people insinuate that stay-at-home moms don’t work. Really? Last time I checked, caring for children, preparing several healthy meals a day, keeping a clean house, minding a marriage, and meeting all of the family’s needs is a full-time job.
If the stay-at-home moms decided to stop doing any of those things, they’d have to be hired out to people who are skilled at doing those things! The stay-at-home mother is a childcare professional, a personal chef, a housekeeper, a relationship counselor, and a family planner and organizer. Those are job titles that real people charge real money for – just because the stay-at-home mom doesn’t earn a paycheck doesn’t mean her work isn’t valuable and necessary…which leads to my next point…
5. Remember that your value doesn’t lie in a paycheck
You are working for your family and the Lord and you will receive your payment for the years of unseen work you put in in the home in the next life. He sees, and He remembers! Of course, as the years go by, you will reap little (and big) rewards in this life too if you are faithful – but it can take time, so be patient.
As we discussed at the beginning of this post, most of us were not raised to view homemaking or mothering as work, let alone valuable work. I bet you can probably remember hearing comments like “Must be nice” or “What does she do all day?” regarding stay-at-home moms. We need this to stop. These comments are so unhelpful and disrespectful. Plus, our children are listening. They hear those comments. To little ears, this sounds like – “women are only as valuable as their paycheck.” Is this what we believe? It’s certainly not true.
Ironically, the same generations who disparage the homemaker will also reminisce about their grandma or great-grandma who was always there, always had fresh cookies, wisdom, and love to share…she was a homemaker and they have nothing but fond memories of her. They may even say things like “They don’t make them like her anymore!” or “Those were the good ole days!” There is blindness present when we can not see that the loving presence of a mother in the home is a huge part of what made those old days good.
The best things in life are often unassociated with a paycheck or price tag. You may or may not earn any income as a stay-at-home mom, but you will get to experience all of your children’s firsts, you’ll get to comfort them when they are hurt or experience failure, you’ll get to cheer them on when they do something new or succeed – you’ll get a front row seat to all of it…to their entire childhood. And that is priceless. That is a greater reward than any paycheck.
