Tips for accelerating smoothly into second gear? (New to manual)

I've had my new mx-5 for a few weeks now and I'm having a lot of fun with it. This is my first time driving manual and while I'm now ok at it, I feel like my transition to second gear is far from ideal. I feel like I tend to shift from 1st to 2nd around 2000 rpm and lose momentum and rather unnaturally slow down momentarily (e.g. coming out of a stoplight). Or I push the gas a bit and get to 3000 rpm or so before changing gears and have a bit more momentum to rely on, but I think I'm burning a lot of gas there and probably not achieving a lot. I.e. I'm still getting dusted by the guy in the next lane when I transition to second gear :(. Advice for a newbie manual driver? PS. one random thing that has made my driving experience better is getting stick on blindspot mirrors. When the top's up it makes me feel a lot more confident about lane shifts, etc. via /r/cars http://ift.tt/2tC5x6n