Posted on 10 Comments

Routines and sticking to them

Clean dishes


I don’t remember if I posted about this before, but last Thursday was Aidan’s first day of school, and I decided it was also my first day of the new Fall routine. And I did great. I got up, took a shower, started a load of laundry, got the kids fed, walked Aidan to the bus stop, came back and moved the laundry to the dryer, cleaned the kitchen, put away the laundry in my bedroom that had been stacked on my dresser the entire summer, and folded & put away the newest load of laundry. All before lunch. I spent the afternoon doing business-related tasks, planning the week’s menu, and creating my food shopping list.

Friday was Eamonn’s first day, and it was really just an open house, drop in and play for an hour kind of thing. I got the laundry started that day, but pretty much did nothing else I was supposed to do, I was that derailed from having to spend the morning out.

The weekend was useless routine-wise, as it always is.

Today, Monday, was orientation at Eamonn’s school (they really seem to go a little overboard in easing the kids into it there…) so it was another morning out of the house. I had started the laundry before we left, but again found myself completely out of the whole routine mindset. I’m happy to report that I did gain back a smidge of my momentum after lunch. I managed to do the food shopping for which I had made that list back on Thursday, and that’s something.

I have high hopes for tomorrow. Eamonn doesn’t have school on Tuesdays, and I don’t have anyplace to be in the morning. It sure would be nice to have another day like Thursday…

YAWN!

Nothing more thrilling than talking about housework, eh? Maybe if I actually do some housework tomorrow, I will reward myself with some crafty time and can post the fruits of my labor. I read somewhere that this was supposed to be a crafty blog icon_smile-flickr-2-3

Oh!  I keep forgetting to mention this! Do you Twitter?  I do now and then.  Feel free to follow me.  The mundane fascinating little bits of my life that are too small for a blog post sometimes end up there.   When I think of it.  If I feel like it.  It’s pretty casual.

And lastly, someone I’ve known for several years online is facing a cancer diagnosis.  If you are the praying type and would like to keep her in your thoughts I’m sure it would be appreciated.

Now, off to catch  up on my email.  It has this nasty habit of multiplying when I’m not looking…

LET’S KEEP IN TOUCH!

Sign up for occasional Polka Dot Cottage news and get a coupon for 10% off your next order!

Don't worry, we won't bother you more than once or twice a month!

Posted on 10 Comments

10 thoughts on “Routines and sticking to them

  1. Routines are good, but only if you don’t mentally punish yourself if you slip out for a day or two. Being an ADD scatterbrain myself, I have my housework in my palm pilot. Even the stuff that I couldn’t possibly be unaware that it needs doing, like the laundry or the cat boxes. Plus, if you break the housework up so that it’s only a few things a day, it doesn’t seem like such an overwhelming task.

    I do have to say, though, that with everything covered with dropcloths and no working washing machine, my house certainly does not look like it’s kept by someone who tracks her housework in a palm pilot. Heh.

    1. Neil insists I have ADD, too 🙂 Who knows, he may be right! I have all of my housekeeping tasks, down to the most mundane, listed in Outlook. I created them as recurring tasks, so that I can check them off when they’re done, and have a new one created for the following day (week, whatever) without me having to think about it. It was working really well for a while, but has been harder since I decided I don’t want to use Outlook anymore. As soon as I can get around to finding a good substitute for my calendar & task list applications that supports recurrence, color-coding, and synching to a palm, I’m switching!

      1. Oooh, sounds more like OCD than ADD. (Then again, we ADDers often spend more time organizing, messing that system up, and reorganizing, than actually accomplishing anything!)

        1. Yeah, well, he’s accused me of having that, too 😉

  2. what a great post, I don’t even have kids and am crap at routines, I just have to make it to work for 7am, this morning at 7am i was putting make up on and still had 101 things to do and drive the half hour to work, so you can see how mine go to.
    kara
    xxx

    1. Yeah, I’d say you could use some organization in your mornings 😉

  3. I had high hopes, too, of routines, order, neatness in my home when the kids started school. They’ve been in month now, & I’m not there yet! We’ll keep on, tho, won’t we? Maybe one day we’ll master it & have all day to craft…

    Kelly

    1. I’d be so much better at it, if I wasn’t constantly distracted by more entertaining things. I think I need to bribe myself – I have a shirt I want to make, and maybe I’ll allow myself to do it after I’ve completed some housework and order processing. I really need rewards for doing boring things, or I’ll never get to them. I’m such a child in that respect 😉

  4. I will certainly think postive thoughts and say prayers for your friend.

    I’m in the process of doing my fall cleaning and agree with your idea that some kind of routine would be good. It’s so easy to get sidetracked and then things get out of whack awfully fast.

    1. Thank you.

      Sidetrack is my middle name. I’m sidetracked as we speak 🙂

Leave a comment!

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.