Last time I wrote about how I was learning to be a better wife and mother by simply staying home and saying NO to more activities. Now, I am still learning, so I am admitting that I sometimes (okay, often) slip on the "not over committing myself" thing. (I feel like I am at a support group, sharing my failures and looking for reassurance here. Not that there is anything wrong with that. There is probably more than one 12 step, self help book out there that I should be reading...)
Anyway, in all the chaos of life, I started looking for a way to make my day work for me. With the nursing, with classes for the older kids and with some decent amount of house keeping. What I found was a book called "Large Family Logistics". I have been following the author's blog for a while, admiring the false image of togetherness that I imagine her life to be. When I first got the book, I went right to the part about organizing my week.
Organizing your week is assigning a day of the week for certain jobs and tasks. For generations women have used this system to help them stay on top of chores like washing, mending, and running errands. Most people use a system that ends with Sunday as their day to rest and go to church. That doesn't really work at my house because we observe a Saturday sabbath. I have heard of other families that keep a Saturday sabbath using a similar system, but they all seem to use Friday to do their cleaning. That doesn't work for me either. I turn into an angry, frenzied housekeeper, rushing to get the house done and food prepared before we can kindle the sabbath lights, and berating everyone within ear's shot about the lousy job they are doing. That doesn't make for a very peaceful sabbath! I feel that the author of "Large Family Logistics" encourages the reader to find a schedule that works for them. The focus is on being home to actually care for your home and family.
Our week goes something like this -
Sunday is yard day, we work outside, clean out cars, clean out the chicken coop.
Monday, office day, when I do paper work and check emails, and, ideally, blog.
Tuesday is our town day. We have a club the older kids attend and I run as many errands as I can on that day, often leaving off less important ones for other days. Ideally, this would be our only day away from home, but keep reading.
Wednesday, kitchen day. If I'm thinking the night before, I start a batch of beef or chicken stock in my slow cooker and its ready on Wednesday. It is also the day that I precook extra meals or freeze or can foods. It helps that Tuesday is my day to shop.
Thursday is cleaning day. I find this helps me not go crazy, rushing to get everything done before 6 pm on erev shabbat.
Friday is laundry day, but right now we are committed to be at the boys' club that afternoon. If I work it right, I do laundry all week and we have time for folding in the morning.
The boys do school work after breakfast and their morning chores. We are working on getting to the fun stuff like art and field trips, something that I hope will happen when we are done with the club. So far this system is mostly working. It has really helped with prioritizing. If I don't get to a certain task on it's appointed day, often it just gets crossed off the list or bumped to next week.
We are slowly regaining the peace of our lives around here. Keep your chin up, it will get better :)
