Morning Routine With a Newborn

Our family thrives on a routine. Before our 4th baby arrived I knew I would have to develop a routine we could easily adhere to in order to ensure our children's schooling did not fall behind. We are not rigid with our routines but we find they are the backbone of our day. The children enjoy the rythm and seem more balanced in their behavior when we adhere to our routines. It doesn't always work out perfectly but below is our ideal morning routine...

Morning Routine:

Our rooster starts crowing around 4am and that is usually the time I wake to feed my baby. I will lay in bed and cuddle her till about 4:30 or 4:45 (ETA who wrote that? this no longer happens. I guess technically it does but then daylight savings happened so it is now 5:30 or 5:45) and then I get up. It's early, I know but I am refreshed at this time and I have found if I go back to sleep I feel more tired when it is time for me to get up at 6:00.

1. Feed baby girl 

 2.Quiet Time: This is the time I read my Bible, write in my prayer journal, give thanks, dedicate my day to the Lord and ask Him to give me a soft heart, gentle temperament and kind yet firm disposition. I pray for a passion, love and delight in God's Word. "For then you will delight in the Almighty And lift up your face to God." Job 22:6

3. Workout routine

4. Pack husband's lunch and green smoothies for us to enjoy for breakfast (he eats breakfast tacos at work and I will have eggs later with the children).

5. Blog. I aim for 3-5 entries per week (haha, I'm lucky to get 3).

6. Breakfast with children (eggs, fresh from our chickens). I then go over my daily planner/to do list and meal plan. Proverbs 16:3 says "Commit your works to the LORD And your plans will be established." I commit my day to Him and pray we honor Him in all we do.

7. Between 8:30 and 9:00am I get the children on track with their daily chores. I find the children do best when I go into their room with them and start helping them rather than just giving them a list of chores to do on their own. Once they have a good momentum I'll throw on a load of laundry, make my bed and get dressed.

8. Bible study with kiddos. We pray, sing some fun praise songs, go over our weekly memory verse and the children enjoy morning snack while I read. It is usually time for the baby's morning snack as well :)

9. Begin math, reading and writing. In order to effectively homeschool with a newborn, I sought programs that would intorduce the material to the children while I could nurse or help the other two school. For math we use Teaching Textbooks (I will give a full review in a later post). Reading, spelling and vocabulary are Reading Bear and now adding Progressive Phonics (thanks, Jen). Writing is Explode the Code(workbooks purchased from Amazon) and we write out a new memory verse each week.  We use Classical Conversations for History, Science, Latin, English and Geography. These are not affiliate links.

12:00 lunch

12:30 clean up lunch and sing Classical Conversations memory work.

I recently thought it would be wise to do some early spring decluttering so we discussed taking a week off from our routines. By Thursday we were all going stir crazy. Things didnt get accomplished as I had hoped and the children were bored. Friday we implemented our routine and the children had a much better day and I got a lot more accomplished. Seems somewhat contradictory  but hey, it works for us! I enjoy hearing other mom's routines as we are always tweaking ours to fit the changing seasons of life. Please share what your morning looks like in the comments below. I would love to get ideas from you for our next season of life!

Grace and peace,

Adoring Family

linked:
HipHomeschoolMoms.com

5 Tips For Your Newborn's First Month

1. Relish every second. The first few weeks of a newborn's life are an incredibly joyous time but they will fly by. It will be 8am, you will blink twice and it will be 8pm. Trust me, I have experienced this 4 times.

2. Hold that baby. Let her fall asleep in your arms, not a swing. You will NEVER get this sweet time back. Kiss her, cuddle her, squeeze her every chance you get. Psalm 90:12 teaches us to number our days. Remember that as you bond with your precious blessing.

3. Give yourself grace. If you homeschool take a break (more on homeschooling with your newborn in another post). Your dishes may get backed up, the carpet may need to be vacuumed and the floors mopped. It's okay. Everyone will be admiring your precious newborn when they come for a visit and will not care a thing about your un-mopped floors.

4. Receive help graciously. If your church offers meals, gladly say thank you and enjoy them. One of my favorite things to do for  a new mom is prepare a meal because I know how appreciated they are! If you grandmother wants to come sweep your floors, let her. It blesses her to help you. Mark 9:41 "For whosoever shall give you a cup of water to drink in my name, because ye belong to Christ, verily I say unto you, he shall not lose his reward."

5.Take pictures and videos every day. Take tons of pictures and videos. Hire a photographer or try taking professional looking photos yourself. There are numerous tutorials on taking newborn photos on Pinterest. Don't stress about though and don't try to make every photo perfect. Just snap away so you can remember your baby's first weeks.

Enjoy this fleeting, blessed season.

I love this excerpt from the poem "Babies Don't Keep" 

 The cleaning and scrubbing will wait till tomorrow,
For children grow up, as I’ve learned to my sorrow.
So quiet down, cobwebs. Dust go to sleep.
I’m rocking my baby and babies don’t keep. 

by Ruth Hamilton

 

Grace and peace,

Adoring Family

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