Friday, March 18, 2011

Managing Time

All I can say is where has my time gone??? I have taken on a huge responsibilty as my children's school PTA President and it has become a leech of my time. Even has I sit here and write I am inturrupted with phone calls and dealing with other issues. After the busy week I have had, with absolutely no time for housework, blogging, or even hardly time to prepare a decent meal for my family, I have come to the conclusion it is time to take back my precious time.

At the beginning of the year I had created a beautiful schedule to help me focus my time on a daily basis. Now mind you very rarely did I stick with the schedule exactly because life is so unpredictable especially when you have an 8 year old, a 6 year old, a 1 year old, and a husband.
I think the most beneficial thing that came out of making my schedule is actually breaking my day down into half hour increments and seeing how much time there was in a day. This allowed me to take a hard look at what I was doing with my time and where it was disappearing to.

As is the way of things, my life is ever involving, enter my new commitment, Cassidy's soccer practice 3 x's a week and possibly Claire's Tae Kwondo classes. So now it is time yet again to tweak that schedule to better help myself manage time. Also I am in need of a wake up call...I can only spend so much time working at the school on a weekly basis and I need to learn to stick to a schedule so I have time to keep my home a haven and also time for myself even if its only a half hour a day.

I have added my pre-tweaked schedule here so you can see how I created mine. Its a simple spread sheet. Again I will be making some changes to mine to fit around the new activities that have entered into our lives these past few months. Remember there are only 24 hours a day, which sometimes seems like not enough, until you break it down and see what is actually stealing your precious moments.
A Day in The Life of the Bennett's
Time Task Time Task
06:30:00 AM Devotion/Prayer, Make Bed 03:00:00 PM Girls snack

Empty Dishwasher

07:00:00 AM Girls up & Dressed, Me dressed 03:30:00 PM Work




07:30:00 AM Serve Cassidy & Claire Breakfast 04:00:00 PM Work

Check Email, Girls to school
Girls' Homework
08:00:00 AM Mine & Cayleen's breakfast 04:30:00 PM Work

Clean-up breakfast/what's for dinner?

08:30:00 AM Laundry (put away/start load) 05:00:00 PM Start Dinner

prep dinner if needed, House rescue
Switch Laundry to dryer
09:00:00 AM Blessing – 15 minutes 05:30:00 PM Make Coffee

Zone – 15 minutes

09:30:00 AM Cayleen nap, brush dogs, sweep & 06:00:00 PM Dinner time

vaccum

10:00:00 AM Snack, blog 06:30:00 PM Clean-up kitchen



Make Lunches, take pill
10:30:00 AM Me Time (see weekly schedule) 07:00:00 PM Bath time for girls (T/TH/Sat)



Family Night – Mondays
11:00:00 AM
07:30:00 PM Desert




11:30:00 AM
08:00:00 PM Cayleen to Bed



girls pick up toys, story time
12:00:00 PM Lunch, Clean up lunch 08:30:00 PM Girls brush teeth



Cassidy & Claire to bed
12:30:00 PM Errands, Work, Volunteer, 09:00:00 PM Read, TV

Plan, To Do's

01:00:00 PM
09:30:00 PM




01:30:00 PM
10:00:00 PM Brush teeth, wash face



Bedtime
02:00:00 PM







02:30:00 PM Errands, Work, Volunteer,



Pick-up girls from school









Home Blessing:
Zone:

Monday sweep porches
Yard/garage

Tuesday Swish & swipe MB/grocery plan
kitchen

Wednesday mop, wash bedding, office day
Wk 1 hallbath Wk2 Girls' rm Wk3 Baby's rm Wk4 Laundry rm

Thursday bathroom trash, windex
Wk 1&2 Master bedroom / Wk 3&4 Master bathroom

Friday garbage to street, dust, & clean kitchen table
Wk 1,2,3 - living room / Wk 4,5 Office

Weekly Errands & Planning

ME TIME Schedule

Monday Work
Monday Scrapbook – snapfish
Tuesday Financial, Meal & Grocery Planning/volunteer
Tuesday projects
Wednesday Work
Wednesday garden
Thursday Pay bills / Grocery shopping / volunteer
Thursday computer time
Friday Blog Planning
Friday Scrapbook