Rise and shine Pretty Palace Organizers out-there! This week's dedicated to one of my least favorite words.... shhhh... I still don't like saying it out loud, it makes me feel tied down.... ready?Schedules. I've been trying to maintain my Beautiful Life (thanks Melissa!) lately and time management needs readressing.
Ahh... I know. Well, in truth there are a good measure of you ladies out there who were born with a Franklin Planner for a brain.... I totally missed out on the line where those were being handed out, probably because I had to rise early and get there on time. So, confessional moment number 1089.... I'm allergic to schedules. Trying to get me to sit down and draft a schedule is like giving your cat a bath... this "cat" can however be lured by chocolate. That's how hubby reformed me... well almost ... I still fall off the wagon now and then.
If you wanna get it all done, you gotta have an execution plan... and no, my plan hasn't killed anyone yet. This week is going to be a great week to begin your homemaking resolutions again! Get your supplies ready: Chocolate (enough to get you through planning your day), Calendar, Notebook, and some of those sticky tabby divider colored thingy's see this post.
If you want a guide book to how I run my life... well mostly. I don't think this author has 6 kids and ever had to attend 4 school Christmas parties on the same day within the same 2 hours, but she's a guru in her own right and she guruized herself in ink with this book. BUY IT... BORROW IT... don't steal but BEG someone for it if you can. It changed my life... not quite as much as having those 6 kids did though... what a doozy.
If you wanna get it all done, you gotta have an execution plan... and no, my plan hasn't killed anyone yet. This week is going to be a great week to begin your homemaking resolutions again! Get your supplies ready: Chocolate (enough to get you through planning your day), Calendar, Notebook, and some of those sticky tabby divider colored thingy's see this post.
If you want a guide book to how I run my life... well mostly. I don't think this author has 6 kids and ever had to attend 4 school Christmas parties on the same day within the same 2 hours, but she's a guru in her own right and she guruized herself in ink with this book. BUY IT... BORROW IT... don't steal but BEG someone for it if you can. It changed my life... not quite as much as having those 6 kids did though... what a doozy.
Buy my favorite book HERE!
How much time each day do you devote to cleaning? How much time do you devote to all of the other important things going on in your life? When I was 25"ish" I figured out that whatever it was I was doing, wasn't cutting the mustard. I needed to make a few life changing adjustments.
So I took stock of what time I had in a day, blocked out how much was devoted to eating, meal prep, and caring for kids, dressing, etc... you get the idea. There are only SOOO many hours in the day to get things done and to ensure I accomplished what was most important, I made a plan.
Here are a few tips to creating your cleaning schedule:
Here are a few tips to creating your cleaning schedule:- Inventory your time: Use a simple calendar. Write down the hour you wake up and the hour you go to bed. Block out times for meal prep, child care, work, nap times, errands... In short, determine what your daily schedule looks like so you know where you can fit in priorities like cleaning.
- Estimate how much time you need to keep house: A rough house cleaning estimate is 1-1.5 hours per person in the house each week. For a family of 8 that's 8-12 hours of cleaning!!
- Priorities what cleaning needs to be done each week. For me, it's bathrooms and if you have boys you KNOW what I'm talking about. Is it a MUST that all windows are cleaned each week? Nah... Just keep your priorities in order and go down the list.
- Block out set cleaning times in your week long schedule: Do what works for you. Some people devote an entire day to cleaning and do maintenance for the rest of the week. Other people do a little every day. What works best for you? You might do bathrooms one day, vacuuming another, and have a day for deep cleaning.
- Rotate your deep cleaning schedule: Cleaning behind the fridge doesn't need to be done each week but it ought to be done. Determine which jobs are monthly or quarterly cleaning jobs and set a time in your schedule to do monthly or quarterly deep clean jobs. Maybe the last Saturday of the month could be set aside for monthly deep cleaning, or perhaps you can concentrate on one room to deep clean a month. Again, this is your schedule do what works for you.
Having a plan is essential to getting things done. I think the most helpful thing for me was realizing how much time it takes to care for all of the needs of my family. It was so great to sit down and figure out how much "free" time I had during a day. Sometimes that free time is scheduled for housecleaning and errands, other times it is scheduled to work in my kids classrooms, and sometimes it may be used for a craft or much needed nap time. The key is keeping your Priorities Pretty Organized. You can't know the time you're wasting or where to trim fat on a schedule unless you block it out. Don't forget to reward yourself with your own free time for a job done well! I LOVE Barnes & Noble cafe... chocolate, books, quiet... doesn't get much better than that!
If you're looking for more tips on time management check out these posts!
- Making your lists
- Identifying Time Wasters
- Hold the Phone... Calls
- Touch it Once
- I'd Lose my Head if it weren't attatched!
How are you with time management?
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11 comments:
Honestly, I'm terrible at time management. My parents used to tell me that I'd be late for my own funeral. I am much better than I used to be, but...I have a very hard time keeping a schedule. I have wonderful intentions, but I tend to fall off the wagon, too. A lot. I'm going to have to look for this book.
Pretty good actually. I broke it into 2 categories, the morning block is for managment type stuff like cleaning,laundry, bills,yard & gardening, chore type if you will. The afternoon block is for Enhancement type stuff like sewing, painting, errands and appointments. Of course with 3 smaller blocks of time for meals dispersed in between. After dinner in the summer is more gardening as I have a HUGE garden. Family time after dinner is the norm. My children are required to contribute to the household as well. I guess you could call it the work before play routine. I am an Artaholic so I had to get to a point where that was managed and did not take over my entire day.
I just read Totally Organized thanks to your earlier recommendation. I really enjoy reading your blog esp. about how you manage your home. Thanks for doing this blog. - Suzanna
Oh yes....you know I am working on this. I will come back and memorize all of your amazing points once I have my afternoon planned out. hee hee :)
Well obviously I'm procrastinating right now because I'm suppose to be doing laundry and cleaning up from school. thanks for the post...it's great to be reminded...and everytime I see toile...I stop and pray for you and your...14 (jk) children...ha ha.
blessings
Lorrie
Great ideas, thanks for sharing. My biggest problem with time management is that I work 2-12 hour days per week, and the days vary, so I can't stick to a pre-determined schedule. I LIKE order, so this kind of drives me crazy.
I used to teach time management classes,- even when I had 5 children, but then God gave me 6 more over a year's period, and now I know nothing! :)
I need to confess I did some blog plagiarizing from you today. I finally learned how to upload pictures from magazines! - and just in time since I'm reviewing a magazine a day this month.
Fun, fun!
Great points! The only way I can manage my time is to simplify what I expect to do. Otherwise even a franklin planner for a brain wouldn't help me! I have to keep up on things a little bit every day and forget perfection on anything.
So hard to juggle, isn't it?
xoxo
love your cleaning plan and pictures are great
I'm pretty good at managing my time but I take a more relaxed approach and see what needs my attention each day. It also depends on the weather, sometimes it's outdoor day and sometimes it's indoor chores.
Manuela
This is a great post! I have no idea how you can manage a blog with six kids in the house, but kudos to you!
Years ago, when I first returned to college after a 19 year break! -- I took a class called "Stress Management." Time management was one of the most important facets of the subject. It has helped me in my subsequent life more than any other class I ever took, especially Algebra and all those others on what happened to Henry VIII's wives!
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