I used to think I was Type A because I loved organizing and creating lists, but in practice I’m a rather spontaneous person. I start with the big picture and tend to figure out the details as I go. If I have to start with the minutiae, I tend to feel tangled up and quickly lose interest. I found out from my truly Type A friend that this is not characteristic of a Type A, so call me Type B. One thing we can agree on is that lists and systems make things better- For A’s: because it provides a snuggly sense of structure and for B’s: the sake of not having to think about it so we can focus on other stuff. I bucked at creating a daily structure for so long simply because I worried it would feel too rigid. I was also worried that “structure” wouldn’t allow time for spontaneity and fun. Thankfully, the opposite was true: having a schedule actually gave me more, consistent, time to do the things that I was passionate about and ensured my priorities weren’t getting crowded out by the more monotonous daily duties. That last part is key. Creating a daily schedule enabled me to build my days around my priorities rather than trying to cram my priorities into a busy day. Being a homemaker is about more than chores and meals, and our days should reflect that. An orderly home and nourishing meals are important but if we’re managing our time poorly and we don’t have a structure- we’ll stay busy with these tasks at the expense of the other roles and priorities. Let’s break this into 2 sections: heart & home!
Creating a daily schedule means building your days from your priorities, rather than trying to cram your priorities into a busy day.
The heart of the matter
Keeping the home is foundational aspect for a strong and healthy marriage, discipleship, training and parenting, hospitality and ministry. Our homes are the primarily places where we model biblical living, and share the gospel on word and deed. Our words and attitudes, under our roofs, are just as critical as the tasks we put our hands to. I was at a women’s retreat when the speaker (an older godly woman) said “You’re never more holy than you are at home.” You can put on a good face in church and at the store but the domain of the home is where your genuine character and faith are tried, tested and proved. (I’ll be doing a post in the future about looking after your heart at home particularly regarding anger/frustration and hopelessness/depression) If I’ve learned (and continuously relearned) anything about joyful homemaking, it’s that it requires a heart of surrender. Specifically, surrendering my days with the knowledge that God is sovereign and sometimes what I would recoil from or view as interruptions are the very things the Lord is using for his glory. Whether it’s children who need some extra training or an example of patience and grace- when I make a plan and surrender the day with a desire to glorify God I’m better able to work from a place of peace and rest.
“You’re never more holy than you are at home.”
The Home
Making a daily schedule, step-by-step!
(If you missed out on the last post be sure to read that first and list out your goals and priorities!)
You’ll need:
-a sheet of paper
-pencil (definitely pencil)
-your list of goals and priorities
1. To start structuring your day, near the top of your sheet on the left side write the hour you wake up. (Ahem, not the hour you’d LIKE to wake up, but the hour you actually, currently get out of bed. Trust me on this)
At the bottom of the sheet write what time you need to go to sleep in order to get the amount of sleep you require. I need a solid 8 but my husband does well with 6, so do whatever works for you but if your current sleeping habits are terrible, start with 8.
2. Next, we’re going to write the times for “non-negotioables”. These would include priorities with regular, fixed times such as meals, school drop-off/pick-up, if you homeschool, book lesson times. Be sure you write the range of how long these things typically take.
These are the bones of your day. This serves as the foundation of your daily schedule. Now, lets put the walls on, make it cozy and call it home! 3. Look at your list of priorities.
These are the ones you’ve vetted and prayed over as they pertain to your current situation and season, same with the goals that we “reverse engineered.” The rest of your day is ready to be filled out with these things, choose a time and give your best guess as to how long they’ll take. Some will be obvious and concrete, like Bible study and exercise! You’ll find a good spot to put those. Some will be a little more abstract depending on what your goals were, like “spiritual growth”, “stop eating out”, “build community” or “personal development”. This is where the reverse engineering will be helpful, particularly with goals like “spiritual growth”. What does that look like to you? Studying scripture daily, listening to a sermon, reading additional study resources- all of these are things you can write as a task somewhere in your daily schedule. Same with personal development- are you trying to learn cooking skills, home-management skills or a new language. Schedule some time to allow for learning or practice! Maybe, like us, a big goal is financial freedom, and while reverse engineering that goal you realize you consistently blow the budget eating chick-fil-A...or something... you should schedule some time to proactively prep dinner so you’re not giving your husband “the look” (the chick-fil-A look, that is) at 5:30 when you haven’t a clue what’s for dinner.
I also *highly* recommend a time slot labeled “chores” or “zone” -we’ll go more into detail on this when we discuss streamlining our housekeeping.
Problem solving:
-Some tasks don’t take more than 5-10 minutes and are already part of my morning or evening routine. If you already have these well established you don’t need to write down every task. Just “Morning routine” with your start and finish time! Maybe you have 3-5 small tasks that can be lumped together but you don’t have a structured routine for them yet, now is the perfect time to do that!
-“I don’t have time for all of my goals and priorities.” First, I’d challenge you to honestly and ruthlessly reevaluate them. If they’re genuinely important and don’t necessarily need to be done every day consider creating a rotation for them during a set time! For example, I’ll use my personal time in the evening to switch between reading, writing, or learning so on my daily schedule its written “personal time” in a time slot with a list somewhere of the priorities I’m rotating. (Although, in the spirit of full transparency my personal time currently consists of writing while the baby sleeps on me or falling asleep while I try to get him to sleep. It’s just a season!)
-“Sticking to an hourly schedule is too overwhelming for me!”
Having a set time with little ones in the house can feel like a recipe for frustration when things don’t go according to plan. I struggled with this one personally. I’d encourage you to write out the schedule with the set times to ensure you’re not overfilling or losing time. once you have it all mapped out and every hour is accounted for transfer your routine to a “Morning/Afternoon/Evening” format. List your tasks under the appropriate section and take a nice deep breath!
You’ve just created a daily schedule customized to your unique family!
For the next week I’d recommend keeping it on the fridge or somewhere visible. As you go about the days make some notes on it. Are lunches consistently longer than you planned? Are naps happening at a different time than they were last week? (Same.) Do you need to allow more time for rest and play? At the end of the week make your re-writes and maybe even type it out all pretty like. This is how you begin to tailor a schedule to your household so it fits like a glove! The best part is you’ll find you don’t need to consult the schedule for a lot of these things because they were already part of your natural rhythms. Eventually you can tuck your daily schedule into your home-management binder to reference when things start to get a little wonky, because life happens, and we all deal with illness, injury, and changing seasons.
Action Steps:
-Pray specifically for your heart as you keep your home. Ask for wisdom and a biblical perspective of your duties, interruptions and challenges. Pray for a heart of surrender.
Create your family’s daily schedule and post it where you all can see it! Be sure to write notes and adjustments as you see the need.
- Draft your family’s daily schedule and post it somewhere visible as you put the rubber to the road over the next week.
Meet me next week and we’ll talk how to streamline our housekeeping and crush overwhelm!
Sincerely,
Abbey
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