The "Mom Schedule"

Ever since we welcomed the Little Diva into our house almost 7 months ago, I've kept telling myself that I needed to get on a schedule.

...I also kept giving myself excuses for why I would wait...

Faith isn't old enough...Its too chaotic with an infant to try to actually plan my day....the list could go on  and on, but I won't bore you with it.

Finally, I decided that my Mother's Day present to me would be to get that schedule written out and in a place that I could see it and be held accountable to myself for it...In a way, I still function like the college teaching/student opera singing diva that I was before I got married and ventured into the baby making business...At that time, my whole day was planned out in a planner, I even scheduled when I would clean my house, make dinner, and what time I would go to bed at night. Without my schedule, my world was chaotic, and I found that I never had enough time to do everything that I did normally, but with a schedule things magically happened...

Well, its not that things don't get done around our house- but I definitely feel like I could be more productive with how I use my time...

So...I wrote out my schedule- but there was no rule that it couldn't be a chic, fun wall decoration for my kitchen, was there?

I didn't think so...

My "Mom Schedule" wall, in all its glory. Complete with Dry Erase Board Calendar.

Here I've taken my "working hours" and divided them, telling me what exactly I should be doing at that exact moment. The beautiful part? I can take the dry erase marker and add an event to any given hour of the day and erase it at the end of the night.

This is my week separated by days. Here, I've written what tasks need to be done on that day. I will explain a little more in detail below.

So...I bought these picture frames before I married Jeff...like 2 years before...and we got a TON of picture frames for our wedding...in fact too many ( a lot of them ended up at thrift stores before our move from our first apartment in Poky- we just didn't have enough wall space or pictures to ever EVER fill them)...and these frames ended up sitting in our closet once we unpacked here in Vegas. There just wasn't enough wall space, and the pictures that were in them were very dated.  I kept saying that I would get some pictures printed and maybe hang them in our bedroom...but we've been here for 5 1/2 months and they were still sitting there...

I was perusing the DIY section of Pinterest and saw a similar idea for scheduling your days of the week using a multiple frame picture frame like the ones above...and I then and there vowed that I would find time to do that too... I had the necessary materials...all you need is the frame, scissors, and some scrapbook paper...you can be a tech savvy and use a printer and scale things down, etc...but I have more fun when I freehand letters, so I just used a pencil and a sharpie...

So...the divisions of time are pretty ordinary...Faith does wake up (or I let her out of her crib) at 6:30 AM...However, I like my "Mommy and Me" time in the morning with my princess. We sit on my bed- she drinks her bottles, I eat my cereal and we watch yesterday's soap operas together...the problem is, its very easy to just want to stay in bed and snuggle until her first naptime at 9:00...so, I decided that I need to make it a point to be out of bed a little earlier. We can continue our "Mommy and Me" time in the living room while I do a general de-clutter and get some baby food ready (because we all know that my girl, if given the choice and chance, would eat nothing BUT solids if she had the dexterity to handle a spoon on her own...I know, we're so mean holding her back...).

As far as the OTHER schedule is concerned...As explained above, its my days of the week with the tasks for the day written down.  If you look closely at my time division schedule, you will see that I have "Clean A" and "Clean B" written down starting at the Little Diva's naptimes.  During any given day, I have assigned A and B chores.  I read an interesting post on C Jane's blog where she explained how she cleans her house in zones.  I was intrigued...She explained how she basically divided her 2 story house into different zones and only focused on one particular zone on any given day. She said that, of course there were daily chores like dishes that were always done, and that she would try to do a general de-clutter of the areas where her children had been, but with the zones, she didn't feel like she had to clean her whole house all the time and it made her life a lot less stressful.

At the time that I read this particular blog, I was pregnant and we were living with my parents to save money.  My "zones" only included our bathroom, bedroom, and the dishes on the days that my parents had designated as being our "turn"...so I filed it away for later.

My townhouse isn't exactly a 2 story house with lots of entertaining space (C Jane has my dream house...) so I continued to file it away. I figured as long as the dishes were getting done and my bathrooms were getting scrubbed once a week, we were golden...but the more time I've spent in my house, the more I realize that if I had a system, things would be cleaned much more often and we would probably have less allergies from dust in the air because- frankly speaking- our carpets are DISGUSTING!

So...I sat down and decided what chores were A and B chores, and what days I'd like to do them. This actually ended up working out. I will vacuum almost every day, the kitchen and bathrooms will be swept and mopped twice a week, and there is a designated day to clean our bedrooms and change sheets...so instead of it happening maybe once a month (I'm really bad about changing sheets...it was one way I was spoiled as a kid. We cleaned everything else in the house, but mom was the one who made sure sheets were changed...) sheets will be changed once a week...  I also have 2 or 3 hour blocks to complete my chores in any given zone, meaning, if I finish before Faith's naptimes are up, I will have time to myself to do whatever I'd like. I can craft and get my handmade craft business back up and running, I can waste time watching movies or blogging, or on Facebook- but it will be AFTER I've completed scheduled tasks...meaning I will be much more productive in a day- because let's face it, its really easy to go to Pinterest and spend half your day looking up every project you've ever wanted to do and not even realize how much time you've spent until your husband walks through the door after work wanting dinner...(guilty...)

So...are you intrigued? Have small kids that aren't ready to help in the house yet? Want to make chore time more productive for your kids and have them all working in the same area on any given day? Try it! (even if you don't have time to make a stylish wall hanging of your schedule) Sit down and write down all the BIG chores of your house (ie bathrooms, kitchen, living room, etc.) you will know what "subtopics" of chores belong in that room- or write out the "sub" chores so you can decide what tasks are good for your children...then designate what time of day you'd like to be doing certain things...you'll be amazed by how much you really could accomplish if you made a schedule (I was kind of blown away by how much time I really would have to complete a given chore once I put it on paper...) I was even able to schedule an hour of story and music/singing time with Faith (that's an hour each- 2 hours of uninterrupted mommy time!) because of my scheduling!

Happy scheduling, darlings...

And...for good measure, after I was finished with being a scheduling goddess, I decided you needed a daily dose of cute (you're welcome...)

Hugs and loves until next time, darlings!