Monday, March 17, 2008

File Your Chores

This great chore system comes to us from Joan, the mother of 2 grown kids, and Grandma to 2 beautiful little girls!

House keeping tips. Read the book "Side Tracked Home Executives"
I'm pretty sure it is from that book that I got the "file" system. What you do is get a file box and get months of the year dividers, and 1-31 dividers. You put a certain number of house cleaning tasks (however many per card) in the 'day' you'll do it. For instance, today is the 18th so for today you may put laundry, ironing, clean the bathroom. When those are done, your day's 'cleaning ' is done! For the 19th you may put vacuum and dust. When that is done your cleaning for that day is done. You can color code your cards too for 'daily' tasks, weekly tasks, monthly tasks (like wiping down the window blinds) and even seasonal tasks like spring cleaning things such as shampooing carpets, washing windows and such. Anyway, you also can make a card for grocery shopping, repetitive appts like hair appts., etc. It really is an effective system and when your day's chores are done you don't feel like you're doddling or not getting anything done. You spread the household chores over 5 days and then start all over again. So if you pull Monday's out and do it then file it for the next Monday and you 'll repeat the same on that day etc etc etc. You can also make cards for your devotions, perhaps reading a book a chapter a day, etc. Be creative and it WORKS! I used it for several years.

Wednesday, March 5, 2008

Ziploc to the rescue

Here are some fantastic tips using ziploc bags brought to us by Miriam, mommy to a fun loving baby boy!

Travel tips: Use ziploc bags - they fit in your diaper bag easy, keep things compressed, easy to pull out, easy to find what you are looking for.

Gallon size
- have an whole change of clothes, diaper, wipe, onesie, and outfit (when your little one has a blow out, you have an easy change without dragging a huge diaper bag, or digging through it for all the right components, and you know you have one complete change of clothes. Plus you can put the messy clothes right back in the bag!

Quart size or sandwich size
- fits two of the Gerber food packs - though "resealable", they leak, and if you do not use all of your fruits or vegetables, they are easy to transport without leaking all over your diaper bag.
- fold several dry paper towels up and place in the bag. They are ready to use without scrambling around when you need them.
- have a wet wash cloth in ziploc (with just a little extra water) - will stay nice and wet and ready to use on a messy face when traveling.

Snack Size
- put your dry cereal mix in these size bags in ready to make portions. Even when traveling for several days, it is less bulky than packing the box.
- infant spoons fit nicely in these bags - easy to find rather than scrambling through the bag, knowing there is one in there somewhere.