Banishing Morning Chaos

September 4, 2009 by Blair
Filed under Time

clocks

by Blair Massey

Does your family struggle with being on time in the morning? Are you tired of nagging, yelling, policing and rushing? Imagine how enjoyable your mornings would be if everyone was ready on time? Maybe you’re thinking to yourself, “That will never happen with my family”. Take heart, there is hope! You can banish the chaos in your morning routine by following these eight simple strategies.

1. Adjust Your Departure Time

By backing up your departure time a few minutes, you can avoid any persistent morning delays. For example, let’s say that every morning right before you head out the door your 14 year old daughter decides she hates what she’s wearing and runs to change her outfit. Her daily wardrobe change consistently puts your departure time fifteen minutes behind schedule. Instead of being late every day, be proactive by setting your departure time back by fifteen minutes. That way when she heads back to her room to change her outfit, you’ll still be on time with a fifteen minute cushion built into your schedule.

2. Make an Adjustment to Your “Sleepyhead’s” Wake-up Time

If you have a child that is constantly late because he likes to hit the snooze button, try setting his alarm to go off 15 minutes earlier. That way he will wake up at the proper time. This also works very well for adults!

3. Make a Get Ready Chart

Help your children know exactly what they need to do to get ready by making a chart that lists all the necessary steps. If you have very young children, make a chart with pictures. When my son was five, I had him make pictures of each thing he had to do to get ready in the morning: get dressed, make bed, eat breakfast, comb hair, brush teeth, get lunch and backpack. Then we cut them out and put them in order on a piece of construction paper which I laminated and put on the refrigerator. Every morning he would look at his chart to see if he had completed his steps.

4. Set up a Bathroom Schedule

If your family fights every morning over access to the bathroom, try setting up a schedule that designates specific times for each person to use the bathroom. You can eliminate these squabbles altogether if you have your children take a shower or bath the night before.

5. Train Them to Be Ready Early

Being on time is great but that doesn’t leave you with any cushion if there is a last minute snag. Without a cushion there is no time to spare and everyone is stressed and rushed. Why not train your children to be early? You can do this by motivating them with a reward. Make it a rule that if they are completely ready and it is still early, they can watch a cartoon or play for the remaining time they have left. This has worked beautifully with our son.

6. Prepare the Night Before.

Instead of trying to do all your preparations in the morning, get as much done possible the night before. Preparing the night before will greatly reduce the stress in your morning routine because you will have completed most of your work in advance.

Below is a general list of things to prepare the night before. Have your children take responsibility for as many of these as possible, according to their age and ability.

Pack up backpacks (school books, library books, homework, permission slips, etc.).
Pack lunches. Don’t forget to include water bottles and midmorning snacks.
Set the table with plates, bowls, cups and utensils for tomorrows breakfast. Set out the cereal or breakfast bars. Adults or older children can portion out vitamins for each child.
Everyone should lay out their clothes, including underwear, socks, shoes and accessories. Help little ones to learn this skill by doing it with them.
Round up sports equipment, gym bags and other things needed for after school and after work activities.
Adults can round up things for work such as their briefcase, work files, laptop and equipment.

Have each person set their things by the door they leave through in the morning. In the morning all they need to do is to grab their lunch, backpack and other stuff, and off they go.

7. Send Them as They Are.

If I catch my son dawdling I remind him that I will take him to school in whatever state of readiness he is in at the time. That means if he is still in his pajamas, or his hair is not combed, that is how he will go to school. When I first explained this to him, he thought I was joking. One day he decided to test me to see if I was serious. I gave him a ten minute warning to finish getting ready. When it was time to go he was still in his pajamas. I packed his clothes, tooth brush, toothpaste and comb in a paper bag and herded him out the door. He was stunned that I had actually done what I said I was going to do. Once in the car he quickly changed his clothes. When we arrived at school he brushed his teeth and combed his hair in the bathroom. From them on, when I would remind him what would happen if he wasn’t ready on time, he would jump up and get ready. In fact, you never saw a little boy get ready for school so fast!

8. Set Your Clocks Ahead

If all else fails, try setting all your clocks ahead by however many minutes your crew is consistently late. Now you can smile knowing that when they think they are late, they are really on time.

Getting your family out of the house on time is not as unattainable as it may seem. By implement these eight simple strategies you can turn a stressful morning into a peaceful and smooth exit out the door.

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Christian Lifestyle expert Blair Massey is devoted to helping Christian women around the world organize and manage their home, family and life. If you’re tired of struggling to keep up at home, Blair will show you how to unlock your God-given organizing ability so that you can start living the amazing life that God created you to enjoy! To learn how, sign up for her FREE newsletter now at www.christian-homemaking.com

Tags: Time

Who’s In Charge of Your Schedule?

September 4, 2009 by Blair
Filed under Featured, Time

1 Comment

to_do_list

by Blair Massey

“How can I be better organized”? “How can I use my time more wisely?” “What new technique can I use to bring some balance into my life?” These are some of the questions I ask myself as I pour over my “To Do” list. In a typical day I can have a list of at least ten tasks that need to accomplished; each just as important as the next.

It is easy to can get overwhelmed when there is so much to do. Do you ever think to yourself: “I am tired of being the chauffeur, cook and laundry maid–I want to have some fun!” If this scenario sounds familiar then let me share with you what God has been teaching me about schedules.

1. What’s at the Top of Your “To Do” List?

Luke 10:38-42 As Jesus and his disciples were on their way, he came to a village where a woman named Martha opened her home to him. She had a sister called Mary, who sat at the Lord’s feet listening to what he said. But Martha was distracted by all the preparations that had to be made. She came to him and asked, “Lord, don’t you care that my sister has left me to do the work by myself? Tell her to help me!” “Martha, Martha,” the Lord answered, “you are worried and upset about many things, but only one thing is needed. Mary has chosen what is better, and it will not be taken away from her.”

Have you ever had a day where you felt that everything depended on you? Martha was having that kind of day. She had invited Jesus and his twelve disciples over for dinner. That meant she had a lot of preparations to make. Because of all the work involved with entertaining this large group of people, Martha was very upset that her sister Mary wasn’t helping her. In Martha’s mind, taking care of her guests was more important than listening to Jesus teach–she could listen to Jesus later. She felt perfectly content with putting the Lord at the bottom of her list of priorities. The result of that decision was that she led a “worried and upset” life.

Martha was focused on the details of the dinner and not on the One for whom she was making dinner. Martha was like many of us. We have our schedules set up for the day, week, month, and year. We work so hard at being organized and productive, but where is God on our list of priorities? Shouldn’t our relationship with Him be at the top of our list? When was the last time you got up early in the morning just to spend some quality time with God? Are you distracted by all the things you need to do?

Mary had her priorities straight. She understood that a relationship with the Lord was the most important thing. That is why she was sitting at the Lord’s feet soaking up his every word. It reminds me of the scripture that says, “For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” (Matthew 6:21). Where is your heart?

2. Pray About Your Schedule

Psalm 143:8 “Let the morning bring me word of your unfailing love, for I have put my trust in you. Show me the way I should go, for to you I lift up my soul.”

As I have been growing in the area of relying on God, He has shown me that I need to go to Him each day for help with my schedule. As I pray, I humbly acknowledge that it is His day and not mine. I ask Him to rearrange or clear my schedule so that I can do what He wants me to do. I can’t tell you how many times I have prayed like this and God has moved mountains from my schedule. I have had appointments be rescheduled and deadlines extended. I have found ways to do a job faster, found that I could put a job off to another day and had a friend call offering to watch my son for an afternoon. All these things have happened AFTER I have prayed. I am learning that I need to do this every day and not just when things get crazy. It is His schedule, not mine. No matter how efficient I make my schedule, I have to remember that He is in control and I am not.

3. Pray Throughout the Day

1 Thessalonians 5:16-18 “Be joyful always; pray continually; give thanks in all circumstances, for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.”

Our day rarely goes the way we thought it would. Emergencies come up, appointments get canceled, people let us down and plans change. It can be very challenging to meet the needs of your family when things get tossed up in the air. You think you have everything covered and then it all falls apart. That is why I love the scripture referenced above. It shows me how to handle every change in my schedule–pray continually!

When a challenge comes my way, I stop and ask God for direction. I ask Him how He wants me to handle things. He always provides an answer.

4. Don’t Rely on Yourself

Jeremiah 17:5-8 This is what the LORD says: “Cursed is the one who trusts in man, who depends on flesh for his strength and whose heart turns away from the LORD. He will be like a bush in the wastelands; he will not see prosperity when it comes. He will dwell in the parched places of the desert, in a salt land where no one lives. “But blessed is the man who trusts in the LORD, whose confidence is in him. He will be like a tree planted by the water that sends out its roots by the stream. It does not fear when heat comes; its leaves are always green. It has no worries in a year of drought and never fails to bear fruit.”

When things are going well with my schedule and I am able to accomplish all my chores, errands and appointments, I tend to drift away from depending on God. Just like the Israelites, I become self-reliant and prideful. “I have it all covered. No need to worry. I am in control.”

It is easy for me to drift away from depending on God when I am not spending time with Him each day. God in His infinite wisdom always brings me back to Him using a little bit of chaos to show me my need. I’ll be cruising along with “my” agenda leading the way and something will happen that throws me off track. God makes it very clear that I am being self-reliant and not God-reliant. When I come to my senses I get down on my knees and pray for Him to lead the way.

When I take my schedule to God in prayer every day, I am like the tree planted by the stream. My load is lightened because God is taking care of all the details. I am free from worry. When I rely on myself I become frustrated and impatient. Then I am that bush in the wasteland. I won’t see any prosperity coming my way even if it is delivered to my doorstep in a gift wrapped package. All I see is the insurmountable obstacles in my way. I don’t see God because I am not praying. I am not praying because I am too busy trying to fix things myself. Does this sound familiar to you?

5. Don’t Worry About What People Think

Hebrews 13:6 “So we say with confidence, ‘The Lord is my helper; I will not be afraid. What can man do to me?”

It is easy to get caught up in what other people think about how we use our time. “Am I doing the right thing? What will my friends think? Will they approve?” You only need to worry about what God thinks. You only need His approval. Do what is right and leave the details up to God.

Now I don’t want you to think that you don’t need to be organized or have a schedule. The point I am trying to make is that we need God’s direction. Schedules, agendas and “To Do” lists are just tools to help us be good stewards with our time. Let God decide what tasks are most important.