Chris Han's mornings begin in motion.
Once Luna is up, the first hour is a blur of small, necessary things: a quick face wash, hair brushing, skincare, breakfast, and getting out the door. Some mornings, Luna wakes up sweet and ready to go. Other mornings, there are negotiations over clothes, hairstyles, slippers, and one tiny preference that can turn leaving the house into a full production.
Somewhere inside all of that, Han tries to get herself ready too. She washes her face, moves through a quick skincare routine, and does what she can to look a little more awake while Luna eats, talks, watches, or stands beside her studying every step.
It's not this quiet, perfect routine. It's more like little pockets of self-care in between mom life.
For years, Han has made beauty and style feel both aspirational and accessible. A Shanghainese creator living in Los Angeles, she has built an international audience around wardrobe ideas, beauty rituals, and helping women discover styles that feel authentically their own. She is also a photographer, a founder, and an entrepreneur — a woman who understands image from both sides of the camera.
But motherhood has a way of rearranging even the most intentional routines. These days, the scene is less about perfection and more about finding meaning in the middle of real life: a daughter watching closely, a mother learning to simplify, and a bathroom counter that has become both vanity and classroom.
The Forty Percent Morning
On chaotic days, Han estimates that about 40 percent of her routine survives.
The extras are usually the first to go. The hot tools. The full face. The leisurely masking. The experimentation she used to have time for. After Luna, Han learned that a routine only counts if it can withstand real life.
"What became more important is consistency and choosing products that actually work," she says. "I would rather stick to a simple skincare routine every day than spend a lot of time on a complicated routine that I can't realistically maintain."
So the non-negotiables became clear: cleanser, serum, sunscreen. If there is time, brows, blush, lips. If there is no time, sunscreen still happens.
Even on a five-minute morning, that step stays. "It's the one step that feels non-negotiable," Han says, "because it protects everything else I do for my skin."
There is something revealing in that sentence. Han talks about beauty less as correction than as care. Sunscreen is not glamorous, exactly. Neither is hand cream, another product that surprised her by becoming essential after motherhood, when constant handwashing left her skin dry. But these are the small gestures that keep her tethered to herself.
If she could only keep five things on her bathroom counter, Han knows exactly what would make the cut: a gentle cleanser, a moisturizer, sunscreen, lip balm, and fragrance. Not because they create a transformation, but because they create a baseline — fresh skin, protected skin, comfort, softness, and a mood for the day. It is the same logic that makes a small, well-chosen wardrobe work harder than a full closet: fewer things, chosen better, used every day.
The Little Girl at the Vanity
Luna notices everything.
She watches her mother pat skincare into her cheeks. She stands beside her and copies the motions. Before trying anything from the vanity, she asks whether it's kid-safe. She wants to know what the ingredients are and what something does for the skin, with the seriousness of a tiny cosmetic chemist. She likes moisturizer, sunscreen, and blush. Anything too heavily fragranced is met with skepticism.
They have their own rituals, too. They pick out outfits together, coordinate colors when they can, and brush their hair side by side.
Han laughs at the questions, but she also understands their weight. Getting ready with a daughter watching is never just getting ready.
I want Luna to see beauty as something fun and creative, not something she needs to fix herself with.
That distinction matters to Han. Beauty has been part of her life's work: fashion, skincare, photography, visual storytelling. She loves the creativity of it, the expression, the ritual. But she is careful about the message underneath. When Luna watches, Han talks about skincare as care, not repair. Products are there to enhance, not erase — to make the morning feel natural and enjoyable, not pressured.
"I want her to grow up feeling confident," Han says, "and I want her to see that getting ready can be a little moment of joy, not pressure."
Sometimes the lesson is as simple as a mirror and a sentence. One day, Luna stood beside her, pretending to do her own routine, and announced that she was "getting ready like Mommy." It was a small moment, but it stayed with Han. Children do not only hear what we tell them. They study what we repeat.
The Grace She Wants Luna to Have
Becoming a girl mom changed the way Han thinks about beauty, and the way she thinks about herself. Before Luna, she says, she didn't fully realize how often women criticize themselves or feel they aren't doing enough. Raising a daughter made those habits impossible to ignore.
It has taught me to be more gentle with myself, and to give myself the same grace I would want her to give herself one day.
She wants Luna to see a mother who is confident but humble, strong but kind, and comfortable being exactly who she is. She loves beauty, fashion, and all the creativity that comes with self-expression, but she never wants her daughter to confuse appearance with worth.
"I want her to know that beauty can be fun," Han says, "but her character, her heart, her confidence, and the way she treats people will always matter more."
Perhaps that is the lesson she hopes Luna absorbs most of all — not perfection, but care. Not pressure, but joy. Not becoming someone else, but learning to be comfortable in who you already are.
Wash Your Face, Grab a Coffee
If a new mother told Han she had no time for any of this, she wouldn't hand her a ten-step routine. Her advice is much simpler: wash your face, put on sunscreen, grab a coffee, and give yourself grace for everything you didn't get to.
Motherhood can be imperfectly good, just like an unfinished morning routine.
For Han, taking care of herself doesn't have to look like a spa day. Sometimes it's five minutes in front of the bathroom mirror before the day begins. Sometimes it's a quick three-step makeup routine. Sometimes it's simply feeling like she showed up for herself in some small way — the kind of small, repeatable act that keeps the woman underneath the mother from going quiet.
The routine doesn't have to be complete to count.
Love in the Most Honest Form
Ask Han what motherhood means to her, and she does not reach for something tidy. It is love, she says, "in the most honest form." Beautiful, exhausting, emotional, grounding. It has changed the way she sees everything, including herself.
"To me, motherhood means showing up every day, even when it's not perfect," she says. "It means loving someone so deeply that their happiness becomes part of your own, but also learning that you still need to care for yourself too."
That balance is the center of Han's current season. She is teaching Luna through values, example, and love, but Luna is teaching her too. To slow down. To be present. To notice the little things. To become more careful with the way she talks about herself. To understand that a child's world does not need to be perfect in order to feel steady.
Your world may not always be perfect, but to your child, you are their world.
It is a sentence that could sound intimidating, but Han does not seem to mean it that way. She means it as a reminder of how much the small things matter. The morning routines. The repeated gestures. The way a mother speaks to herself in the mirror. The way she cares for her skin without making beauty feel like an obligation. The way she keeps showing up, even unfinished.
Enough to Begin
Han's mornings are not quiet. They are not always smooth. They do not leave room for every product, every step, every version of herself she used to have time to be.
But they have Luna. They have the small rituals. They have sunscreen, moisturizer, blush, coffee, questions, matching colors, and a little girl learning that beauty can be something you enjoy without needing it to make you worthy.
That may be the more lasting routine. Not the one on the counter, but the one being modeled in real time: care without pressure, beauty without distortion, confidence without performance, grace for the unfinished parts.
And on the mornings when only 40 percent survives, Han is learning that 40 percent can still be enough.
Follow along: Follow Chris Han on Instagram @chrishanxoxo.
