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I work on schudules everyday that never work to
get shopping,cleaning. mail and bills, cooking,
laundry done . I would love to be organized and have time to exercise and
do more family things.
Ladies..if you get home from work at 5 how to you manage
all the household tasks???
I often try to figure out what should be done daily and what
can be done on the weekend.
I have a H that reluctant to do anything other than yardwork,
but will do things if I insist.
I'll be interested in seeing what others say. I love picking up good tips that make life smoother and easier. I leave home before 7:00 and get home around 5:30. There never seems to be enough hours in a day or week to get everything done.
I have done a couple of things that have helped.
1) I typed up and printed off a 'cookbook' of my favorite recipes, organized by type and course, i.e. vegetable salad, fruit salad, meat salad, bread, breakfast, etc. I put the sheets in plastic sleeves in a notebook. I found templates for menu planners and shopping lists on the internet. I printed off several copies and keep them in the front of the book. This makes meal planning and shopping much easier as everything is in one location. I can even take it with me and if I'm waiting somewhere, I can plan next week's menus, shopping list, etc.
2) No matter what, I clean my house EVERY week. I have it down to a science. I have a plastic organizer that contains all my cleaning supplies - toilet bowl cleaner, Lysol, Tylex, Pledge, Mr. Clean Scrub Pads, Windex, white cleaning cloths, garbage bags, paper towels, etc.
First I empty the trashcans and put in new liners. Then I have 3 bathrooms to clean. I do 1 at a time. I swish toilet bowl cleaner, while that sits, I spray the shower with tilex. While that sits, I clean the sinks and vanity. Then I clean the toilet, wipe down the shelves over the toilet, spray the shower/tub tile down and mop the shower floors. Next I clean the shower doors and mirrors with windex. I remove the rugs and sweep and mop the floors. Next I dust, vacuum and sweep and mop the tile floors in the family room and kitchen.
Each week I do one extra job. Last week I washed all the windows and sills upstairs. Tomorrow I will do all the windows and sills downstairs. Two weeks ago, I washed all the doors and closet doors. The week before I washed the woodwork around the stairs, etc.
If I'm feeling good and don't get sidetracked, I can do all this in about 2 hours.
Laundry is the thing that takes the longest. I usually do it once a week and do about 6 loads - one of towels, one of underwear, 2 darks, 1 light and 1 sheets. I do laundry for myself, DH and DS. They each have their own laundry basket. On Saturday morning they know to take it to the laundry room. I sort and wash. I only dry the towels, underwear and sheets in the dryer. I never dry knit shirts in the dryer. I hang them to dry and I put their dress/work shirts and slacks in the dryer only long enough to get them damp dry and then hang them. They are responsible for picking their laundry up from the laundry room.
Google flylady. She has great tips. Seems like it is geared more towards the homemaker but you can get great ideas to incorporate into your own schedule.
pianogal...thank you for spending time with your ideas. You sound so organized.. I wish I could be!!
I really like the recipe book with meal planner and shopping list all together idea. I already have my recipes in notebooks like you said but I have a notebook for each type. I collect recipes and love to cook new things when time so this gives me an organized way to keep favorites as well as "recipes to try" that I print off .
After reading your post I decided I am going to make a notebook with just
"favorites/regulars". It will be easy to scan and create a new recipe book ,while leaving the others intact.
We are in a big house (that I cannot wait to downsize) so cleaning is
something I have to break up daily and learn how to delegate more.
I am unsure if it is easier to do a room a day and rotate through the house or do a task per day like glass/surfaces/tubs .
My kids do their own laundry (best tip I ever got from a friend!)
I am trying to wash one load and dry and put away yesterdays load
every night. Huge amounts on the weekend depresses me.
I am "training" my hubby to bring down the laundry basket from upstairs
and I can put it in the doorway where he has to practiccally jump it to get by and he still "forgets it " LOL.
Cooking is SO hard to figure out. We want to be budget wise/ quick/
and heathy. I want a cookbook titled CHEAP,EASY AND HEALTHY.
My latest strategy is to get frozen entrees from BJ's and put fresh veg's
with them, but this isn't really heathy. I love to cook and if I could learn to be caught up with the million other things I would like to try some bulk cooking and freezing
on the weekend.
Hmmmm, when I worked an office job I was so fried by the time I got home I was not going to do anything.
Grocery shopping & errands got done Thursday evening on my way home from work.
Saturday morning was my "me" time. I would take a couple of hours & go to the beach with the dog or some other thing that was relaxing. Once I got back from doing whatever I would vacuum, dust, and clean the bathroom. Laundry got done on Sunday so everyone had everything clean for the week ahead.
Now, dinner was another story. With a small amount of pre-planning I was able to get dinner into the crock pot before I headed to work. Nothing quite like dinner being ready when you get home. Does your husband like to grill? Mine does, and many nights we would have burgers or chops or something grilled. Less dishes, KWIM?
You have the advantage of having kids. Do they have household chores? When I was a kid I did the dishes every day, dusted & vacuumed every Saturday, changed my own bed every Saturday, and did my own laundry. My brother was in charge of taking out the trash, mowing the lawn, and sweeping the hard surface floors.
pianogal...thank you for spending time with your ideas. You sound so organized.. I wish I could be!!
I love to cook and if I could learn to be caught up with the million other things I would like to try some bulk cooking and freezing
on the weekend.
Kelly, it sounds like you are organized and on your way to being much more organized than most. I did the bulk cooking thing a few years ago. It was great to have all the meals prepared and in the freezer. I'm a school teacher and I froze about 2 months worth of meals just before going back to school one year. I did it for that year only for one reason. As you know, freezing food changes the taste. The food just did not taste as good. I did everything right, even purchased several books on once a month cooking and followed the recipes to a T and the tips on how to wrap the food for freezing. But the food still didn't taste like fresh cooked.
The one thing I did learn from that experience was how great it is to have cooked ground beef on hand. I have continued to buy ground beef in bulk. Crumble and saute it, place 1 lb. in a quart freezer Ziplock and freeze. Then I have meat ready to throw into spaghetti, stew, soup, etc. Freezing did not seem to affect the taste of the ground beef as it did other types of food.
I'm really interested in this thread as we just moved to a new home (from an apartment) and it is 3,100 sf. I can't seem to get into a cleaning routine, and I can't do it all at once as it's too much. I work from home, so I want to do a bit every morning before I start working, but I can't seem to get a schedule going. Maybe I'm just overwhelmed as there is so much to do with this place. lol.
Katzy.. I am going to try rotating through this cleaning list .
I used to assign days ,but that never worked because when other things
preventing cleaning time I got off schedule. This way if I get ahead or behind I just stick with the same order. Also I can get help when my kids have light homework nights
The funny part is that this is only about the zillionth plan I have had.
If I could clean 30 minutes per day I wouldn't need to spend half my Sat
doing it.
pianogal.....thanks but I am not really organized... I guess I have a few things organized but for cooking,grocery shopping,cleaning, I struggle with
ever following a routine at all.
pianogal...I like the cooked hamburger idea!! last time I bought bulk
porkchops I decided to have my husband grill them all at once and I vacuum sealed 4 /pack and froze them . We are going to have some tomorrow and I will let eevryone know if they froze well and taste as good as the first night. If so that was a good way to save with bulk and
make 4-5 nights of entree.
Laundry got done on Sunday so everyone had everything clean for the week ahead.
I may try that on Sunday..
I like to do as many washes as I can daily so it doesn't pile up, but Sunday would be a good day to catch up.
My kids do their own laundry which helps.
I am terrible about sticking with routine chores for my kids. One just left for college, so only one is at home right now. He takes the trash out and does his own laundry and helps with different things on Saturday.
I do get him to help with different things when I know he has alot of spare time. Giving him a cleaning chore everyweek like the glass cleaning or vacuuming would really help!! He likes to cook, so maybe he could do dinner one night and let me get paperwork /mail done.
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