“I need more time in the day!!” Every mom says this at some point in their life. I can relate to so many walks of mom life and have had to figure out my systems to first survive and then thrive. In different seasons of life, I have worked 17-hour shifts as a restaurant manager, I have lived with clutter everywhere as a mom of 4 babies born within 2.5 years, I have lived a minimalistic small lifestyle full-time in an RV for several years, and I have (and still do) travel a lot while also doing a lot of homesteadish-type things like canning and making homemade bread and yogurt.
I am far from always on the ball but I have found things that helped me take back time in my day. These are some things that made a huge difference for me.
Decluttering
Start with one small area: a drawer, perhaps?
Expand to the rest of that area (the desk or dresser?).
Declutter a whole room.
Tackle the next room.
Your whole house!
Clothes
Papers
Homeschool curricula or books
Unused toys
Unused tools
Unused kitchen items
Knick-knacks
Give yourself time and set small goals (1 small space a day or a week)
Probably the single greatest difference any one thing made in the flow of my day has been massive decluttering. I know, I know, you have probably heard that before and thought that is only for some personality types that are naturally neat and tidy. Let me tell you, I was the biggest pack rat ever. I had clutter, things, papers, all kinds of things EVERYWHERE. It was stressful and so difficult and hard to maintain.
After my mom passed away suddenly, I went on a grief-fueled cleaning spree that led to my start of decluttering. I literally started with my daughter’s shirt drawer. I pulled out all her shirts and realized she alone had over 40 shirts! Why did she have so many?? I kept saving clothes that were not favorites or stained “just in case we need them.” But really, in what case would I need so many? If she went through 3 shirts a day and I only washed once a week that is still twice as many shirts as she needed. So I made a pile of all but our favorites. That one small start motivated me so much that it led to the rest of the dresser, and then the kids room, then my clothes, then my room, and to the rest of the house.
It took me about a month but by the end, I had donated 30 big trash bags full of things as well as thrown out 10 bags of trash, mostly papers I had saved and didn’t need. It felt so good, like breaking off chains of clutter. This was about 6 years ago and I have continued to do a routine purge a couple times a year. This usually only results in a bag or two of things but our life is so much better now. It is massively easier for me to maintain a clean household and because of that, everything feels more peaceful. Plus as a bonus, when you remove junk, the kids have much more meaningful play with toys because they see the meaningful toys without the sea of mess.
Systems
Become systematic! Find systems that work for you and in this season that help you be more efficient but also be aware and flexible enough to recognize when that system needs to be changed. One example I can think of is laundry. Part of my system is that I know 100% that if I do not fold the clothes as they come out of the dryer then I never will. An example of how my laundry systems have changed is that I have had seasons where doing one load a day kept us going. I have had other seasons (such as in the RV) where I did all my laundry in one day at the laundromat.
Part of being systematic is knowing how long a chore really takes. Our minds can make us hesitant to start something because we think we don’t have time. Noticing how much time each task really takes to complete shifts your mindset about starting. When you look at a sink full of dirty dishes, it is hard to realize it only takes about 20 minutes to clean. Or a week's worth of laundry can be done in 2-3 hours at a laundromat.
Connect Chores
Connect chores whenever you can! My side and kitchen tables all used to have a glass top. Whenever I needed to clean one, I would clean all the glass and mirrors in the house plus the fridge and oven.
Another example is toilets. I like to use disposable toilet scrubber pads and cleaning wipes, all of which add to the trash. So every time I need to empty a bathroom trashcan, I first go through and clean all the toilets so that the cleaning trash goes out with the rest. This also gives them frequent enough cleaning that they never get too bad.
Plan Meals
You don’t have to have to be an expert meal prepper to not struggle with nightly meals. I have never been a person who could plan a month’s worth of meals. It has never worked for our family to stock the freezer full of crockpot meals. However, I have modified the concepts to help me become more efficient and make my life easier overall.
I plan meals for each grocery run. Currently, we are paid bi-weekly, so I shop for two weeks at a time with a small trip to replenish some items like milk. I only have to think of the meals I will make during that time span and shop for those meals.
I created a grocery order checklist of every single thing I order from the grocery store. I also included planning spaces for my planned dinners. This keeps me from missing or forgetting to order anything. Grocery day is also my main prep day. My kids love carrots and celery sticks so we peel and cut those on grocery day, too, so they are ready to go in the fridge. I cut and portion all the meat into the amounts I need per meal. They are labeled in gallon-size bags and frozen. This is also much faster and easier to defrost. Speaking of defrosting, each day I decide what I will make in the next two days and pull them to defrost in the fridge naturally without having to rush with half-frozen meat. Prepping on grocery day saves me so much time throughout the week.
There is no one-size-fits-all ways of momming. There is no system that will work every time and forever. I wanted to share these in the hopes that some part will help another mom gain back even a little bit of time. If we can gain back time, that is the currency we can invest in our families and ourselves.
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