The most recent research says it takes 66 days to form a habit. Would you like to become an organized mom in 66 days? I can’t promise you that your entire world will be organized, but I can promise you that if you accomplish these 10 habits on a daily basis for the next 66 days you will begin to feel a sense of control over the “mom chaos” in your world.
Habit #1 Family Command center – create a place to keep a family calendar, kids chore charts, include a shopping list your family can add to , a in box for school papers. Teach your family to the command center daily for upcoming events.
Habit #2 Mom to do lists and Planner – Find a system, that works for you from a cell phone to a binder planner. Keep a master family calendar that includes all commitments, and activities. Create shopping lists, to do list, to call lists. Keeping it all in one place will simplify when you are planning your weeks and errands.
Habit #3 Nightly Clean –up: Each night do a 10 minute Kitchen sweep Put dirty dishes in the dishwasher, clean off and wipe down the counters, clean your kitchen floor with a cordless vacuum, Swiffer or broom. Windex the fronts of your appliances and clean and dry your sink .
Habit #4 The fiver minute house walk thru – Each night along with your children do a 5 minute walk thru of your home to pick it up and put away all items that are not in their correct home and to do a quick tidy up.
Habit #5 Night Time prep – prepare for the next day each evening by packing lunches, school bags, activity bags as well as things you will need to take with you the next day such as library books, store returns, grocery lists etc. Make a list of things you need to accomplish the next day , lay out not only your clothes but your children’s clothes. Think what can I do tonight so I don’t have to do it in the morning when its chaotic
Habit #6 Chores ,Chores and Chores – get your kids involved helping wit the household responsibilities beyond taking care of their own rooms. Teach and train them to do other household tasks from dusting to moping floors. Need ideas on how to get your kids doing chores. Click here for my list of age appropriate chores.
Habit #7 AM and PM Laundry change – Each morning place the first load of laundry into your machine switching it to the drier at dinner time. Doing at least one load of laundry per day will help tame the piles of laundry.
Habit #8 File it , recycle it – Keep those piles of papers under control by creating a desk top file system with easy to access files for Bills to be paid, calls to make, items to take care of, invitations, tickets as well as field trip forms for your children. Look at your piles of papers and create files according to your needs. Then recycle all the no longer needed papers in your pile.
Habit #9 Meal Time planning – Create a list of your families top 20 or 25 meals. Use this list to create a weekly or monthly meal plan be sure to look at your families schedules when planning meals so that you know who will be home and what activities are taking place at what time so you can plan your meals accordingly.
Habit #10 Rotate it – Time it – Create a daily cleaning schedule dividing up the household chores needing to be accomplished each week. Such as Monday dust, Tuesday floors, Wednesday bathrooms, Thursday kitchen deep clean etc. This will break up the 6 to 8 hours of weekly cleaning that it takes to keep up on a clean home.
Do you have a daily habit to add to our list of 10 Daily habits of an organized mom ? Leave your habits in the comments.