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Organized Families is excited to share tips with you from a real mom. Melinda blogs at Coming Clean: Confessions of an Imperfect Parent read on to learn how she keeps it all together as a busy mom.
How do you keep your children’s schedules together ?
I’m a big list maker. For my nine-year-old, I have a list of basic things for him to do when he comes home from school, including homework, putting away his laundry, putting his lunchbox on the counter (so I’m not searching for it frantically 10 minutes after we were supposed to leave) and setting the table if it’s his night.
For my daughter, who is 12, I’ve learned that rigidity with pre-teens just doesn’t work, so my requirements for her are a little more basic. (I have more important battles to fight!) Before she can be on the computer (her favorite thing), she has to finish homework, tidy her room and read a little bit from a devotional book.
I don’t give my kids a lot of time to unwind after they get home from school. It doesn’t work for us. They get off track and then it’s a homework battle at 9:30 at night when my patience and energy levels are on empty. Plus, they both have sports practices, so they really need to get homework and other responsibilities done right away.
Do you use a particular day planner ?
I use a planner called “Hot Chocolate.” I buy all their notebooks, too. They are so fun and funky that I’m more likely to make lists and keep on top of my schedule. I need all the incentive I can get!
Do you own a blackberry?
I don’t. Although my daughter told me today that I “need” to get one. She claims my current cell phone is “so lame.”
What is your most used ‘time saving tip’ when it comes to running your house?
I’d say, “Don’t procrastinate!” Leaving dishes in the sink, for example, makes them so much harder to clean the next day. The more you let things pile up, the longer it takes to dig out. I don’t always follow this, but when I do, it makes my life so much easier. Read More→
There once was a time when I was the Organized mom and I actually had a menu plan. Well at least a dinner menu plan !
So this week I am determined to actually work with a dinner menu plan. I have narrowed it down to some easy, quick dinners based on whats in the cupboard meal ideas and tried to think about what I can double cook for later in the week.
I am also thinking I may start using someone elses menu plans for the following week (payday is next Wednesday which will allow me to shop based on the menu plans). So I have started looking for a few different menu plan groups and menu plan e books.
So onto sharing my menu plan for the week (I didn’t plan menus for lunches, as my children eat lunch at school and I eat left overs or just have cereal :) ! )
Monday:
Breakfast - English muffins cheese slices (melted on top) oranges
Dinner – Spaghetti bread (bread machine dough) green salad *make extra ground beef for tomorrow
Tuesday:
Breakfast – Poached Eggs Whole wheat toast Melon
Dinner- Tacos – Mexican Rice (rice cooker do you have one yet ?) – tomatoe/cuke salad
I gave up my PALM treo addiction last month in favour of a Blackberry Curve. I needed a new remotely based calender system that I could easily share with others and my palm treo didn’t provide the ability to sync effectively to a remotely hosted calender.
I settled on Google Calendar for keeping my work home family and children’s schedules together and the blackberry seemed the way to go. It’s been three weeks and it’s working great.
I have assigned each of the six kids their personal colour and my black berry easily updates my calender as I go using Google Sync for Balackberry. You can find out more about Google Sync for blackberry at the google blackberry sync page.
You can also sync google calender with other devices:
Sync Google Calender with mobile devices
The local playground has bloomed with a carpet of white tiny daisies and the sun was shining all day yesterday. Which leads me to thoughts of spring cleaning and none too soon since I see that a few of the corners of my house have some small spider webs when the sun shines through the window just right!
I can’t help but wonder why we all feel a need to spring clean, so I spent a few minutes looking up spring cleaning online to discover that spring cleaning is defined as “Spring cleaning is the period in spring time set aside for cleaning a house, normally applied in climates with a cold winter.”
This makes sense since those of us up North are limited by cold wet weather during the winter months. I can’t easily run outside with a rug to beat it with a broom. OK I wouldn’t actually ever do that. I have included some free printable spring cleaning checklists below for everyone though!
For me spring cleaning is about purging. It’s when I go through the kids clothing for summer, pack up winter items and while I am at it give the closets and rooms a good vacuum and wipe down.
ListPlan It offers a great Spring Cleaning Checklist for those of you looking for a checklist to help you get through the spring cleaning on a task by task basis.
Most of my check lists come from ListPlan it, it’s a affordable solution and definitely saves me more then enough time to justify the small membership fee.
I have three major Spring Cleaning items that have to get done in my home each spring. 1) the kitchen top to bottom. 2) My mini van – this year I am taking it in to be shampooed 3) The ceilings , light fixtures, and fans.
Here’s a list of Free Printable Spring Cleaning Checklists:
List Planit: Get Organized for Spring
Our Busy Family Life: print spring cleaning checklist
Clean and Shiny: print spring cleaning checklist
Martha Stewart: spring cleaning list
My review of Lorie Marrero”s book The Clutter Diet, is a tad behind schedule having spent two weeks with a virus running through the house.
I wanted touch on two things that caught my interest thus far and provide an outline of the book (some of the more technical stuff) today.
The Clutter diet is several chapters long plus room by room tips, a total of 260 pages (excluding acknowledgments). I was concerned at first glance that the book may be a bit lengthy for limited free time.
