Morning Routine & Rolled Oats

I’ve been trying a different morning routine for the past two weeks and it seems to be working pretty well for me. I made two major changes in my morning routine:

Wake Up Time
To give some context, I’m not a morning person and I struggle to wake up every. single. morning. of. my. life. To me it is more normal and humane to be awake at 9-10AM than anytime before that. And regardless of how tired I am on any particular day, I can easily stay up past midnight (and actually feel more awake once the clock goes past 9PM). As a result I often have to take taxi to work (and it’s not cheap at around $20 per trip!), feel guilty about it, resent having to wake up early, and on and on.

Recently I was thinking about it and came to the conclusion that since I can barely wake up in the morning (I put on my alarm for 7AM, tried to be ready by 8 and reach office by 9), the one hour I gave myself to get ready is probably not enough. Often it’s even less than an hour because I’d cheat and sleep in some more.

So I decided to: WAKE UP EARLIER!

Ha!

May sound counter-intuitive. Like how can I get up earlier when it’s hard enough to do so at 7AM?? But I thought since I’m slower in the mornings and not very motivated to do things quickly and energetically, I should then give myself ample time to get ready so that I’ll not be late.

Surprise surprise… it works!

Right on the first day I woke up at 6.30AM, I went to the ironing board straight away, switched on the iron and then got breakfast ready. By the time I put my bowl of oatmeal in the microwave, the iron is hot and well-prepped to do its job. After ironing, I felt more awake with all the ironing movements and may even felt hungry! So breakfast came after ironing. Then I washed my oatmeal bowl & spoon, brushed my teeth and got ready to shower. When I was done showering, it wasn’t even 7.30 yet and I had plenty of time to get ready! So that very first day was a huge success and I’ve been keeping it up for the past two weeks! Yayyy…

These days I can even squeeze in some light chores like drying the laundry or taking them down, fold and put them away, etc. One day I even had time to straighten my hair.. haha! I haven’t had time to style my hair before work for so long!

Anyway I’m pretty happy with how things turn out. The hardest part is simply to get off bed and straight to the ironing board first thing in the morning! Hahaha.

So it’s been two weeks and I’m happy to share my new morning routine:

6.30 – 6.50: Turn off alarm, switch on the iron and prepare my breakfast (usually I just microwave one serving of rolled oats in water – no milk cos I can’t stand how creamy it gets with milk).

6.50 – 7.00: Finish ironing Robby’s work shirt of the day, eat breakfast, wash bowl, brush teeth.

7.00 – 7.15: Go back into the room to disturb (wake up) Robby & get ready to shower. I may do light chores like hanging the laundry.

7.15 – 7.40: Shower & get dressed.

7.40 – 8.00: Make up & get ready to leave.

Breakfast
This is the second major change. I used to eat my breakfast in the office but I had been wanting to eat before I leave home so I don’t have to waste time eating in the office.

At the same time I’ve been wanting to eat more healthily and my friend Jade has shared her love of rolled oats and how she incorporates it into her daily diet. So I thought, why not try it. And I’m glad I did!

Ok personally the very first time I tried oatmeal porridge in the past, I really really hated it. It’s so sticky and gooey and YUCK! Someone persuaded me to give it another try and she made me a nice bowl of oatmeal porridge with raisins, honey and a little bit of sugar. It tasted good and not too thick.

I guess the trick is to add enough water / milk to make it to the consistency you like. Also she cooked the oats in water instead of milk so it’s not so creamy. But it was still rather thick and I get full really quickly eating oatmeal porridge.

The thing is I had only tried regular oatmeal, not rolled oats. And so when I decided to take Jade’s advice and tried rolled oats, I was happy to find that I like it better!

How I make my oatmeal:

1. 1 serving (35g or 1/4 cup) of rolled oats
2. Add enough water to cover all the oats, and a bit more
3. Microwave on medium for 2 minutes
4. Mix and let sit for a few minutes (while I finish my ironing) to cool slightly and let the oats soak up more water.
5. Add 1 tsp of sugar and mix
6. Add a slosh of cold milk (this is more like a tablespoon to me) partly to help cool it down further and partly to add more liquid so it’s not too thick for me. And yes a bit of milk adds a nice taste, but I don’t want too much of it. But if you love milk, go ahead and replace water with milk instead.
7. Add 1/4 cup of blueberries (around 12-15 blueberries usually).
8. Enjoy!

So there you go! Oh and if you read Jade’s blog, she shared her overnight oats recipe which I also tried. It’s good, especially if you love milk. Haha. But I prefer my oats in water and slightly warm so I experimented and happily settled on the above.

To be honest though, my fave kind of breakfast will be a full meal of rice or noodles with various dishes. I can eat anything for breakfast really. But again… I’m trying to be healthier. So there you go. Rolled oats with blueberries: healthy, nutritious, very filling and low calorie. =)

What’s your fave breakfast item?