8 steps to a more efficient mom

Is it just me or does it feel like your head goes in circles trying to get out that door in the morning for work and school? You have to remember lunches, water bottles, laptops, nap blankets and anything else you may need for your day all while trying to get the kids to eat breakfast. I must say 10 times every morning, HURRY UP AYVEN, we gotta go or put your toys down, mommy needs to get to work.

It’s complete and utter chaos! Not only does it make us crazy, the kids get even crazier when they see mommy all flustered trying to get out that door. Ever since I had baby number two, I have really tried to make small changes in my life to become a little more efficient and I wanted to share them with you all because they have really been working for me!

• Plan out ALL meals! ALL meaning make your weekly lunch menu of what you need to pack for your kids and your lunch and your husbands if you need to. It will reduce the stress of trying to figure out what to pack and guess what, you won’t be running to the grocery store every day.
• Designate an area in the house as the “to go” spot. Anything you can pack the night before, add it into your to go spot. If your husband is doing drop off, then it will make it so much easier for him. Anything you can prepare to put in the “to go” spot before the morning rush will help.
• Use Apps: There are so many apps out there that can make our life easier. Focus on apps for meal planning, shopping smarter, logging daily activities that you need to remember or even helping you live a healthier lifestyle. Here are a few that the Chai Mommas Love:
  • Baby Connect
  • ibabyfeed timer
  • Diaper Log
  • Goby
  • Red Laser
  • Watterlogged
  • Eyeona
  • Menu Planner
• Use a family calendar: I can’t say how important this is to help communication in your house. If you need to schedule a doctors appointment, don’t waste time seeing if your significant other is home to watch the kids, just look on the calendar and schedule it. It really does safe a lot of time and bickering in the house 🙂 We use Google Calendar in our house.
• Stay on a routine as much as possible: I know you can’t do this everyday but stick to it as much as you can. I bathe both my boys together to save time. Routine life is not only good for you but also for your kids, they thrive off of it. It will reduce definitely reduce the tantrums in the house!
• Make a dinner “cutoff time”: This is something new we started in our house and it has much a huge difference. Make a cut off time that if you have not started dinner in your house by a certain time, it’s an automatic decision just to pick something up. It may not be the healthiest option out there but sometimes you do what you gotta do. I would get off late from work and stress out because dinner was not ready, my kids would be starving and acting up and my husband would come home to a crazy house. It is so not worth it.
• Make a reminder board: Use a cork board or marker board where you can add reminders. If you run out of ketchup, throw it on a “grocery list” or if it’s something you can’t pack until the morning, write it on there so you won’t forget. This will reduce the time you have to sit there and ask your self..what was I supposed to do?
• Take out the kids clothes the night before: This way they can get themselves dressed in the morning. If they are too young to get dressed, I promise it will save you time in the morning just putting their clothes on. Check the Weather Channel App the night before or, if you want to be super efficient, get yourself a personal weather station from somewhere like Ambientweather.com and use that. It will probably be more accurate, plus the kids will enjoy learning to read it.

It’s all about being efficient in our house and these little steps we have taken have made such a huge difference 🙂