- Park your grocery cart near the cart bays so you can easily get grocery’s and kids in and out. Ideal for mom with young kids
- Meal plan when you’re hungry. I’m constantly not sure on what sounds good or what to make but if I meal plan when hungry everything sounds good and I can quickly plan my weekly meals
- Outsource jobs you don’t like to do. For example, we pay our nephew to mow our lawn, and I am paying someone to come deep clean my house. It doesn’t have to be expensive to add this into the weekly budget and gives you more time to play with your kids, run errands, or catch up on what you love to do
- Always make your bed. This sets you up to feeling successful your whole day. Even if nothing else gets done in your day at least you made your bed.
- Clean one space before moving to the next. How easy is it to be cleaning your room and you take something to the kitchen only to get distracted by the dishes, or the crumbs on the table and you start cleaning those? And then finally coming back to your room. It’s more efficient to clean one space and move to the next. Bonus tip set a time and as soon as it’s done move on to the next space. It’s amazing what you can put away and clean up in 15 min.
- Always start your day with nourishing your mind, body, and spirit. Pick one thing to do in each of those categories and get it done by noon. When you take care of your relationship to you your relationships to others will get better too.
- Pre-teach! One of the best things I learned at my job at a residential treatment center was to always be teaching and setting them up for success. Before we go anywhere or before I help them learn a new skill I teach what is going to happen, I teach behavior I expect, I teach how to handle any hard challenges that may come up, and how to do the things I expect. Afterwards, I then follow up with them and we talk about how they feel, and what we can do better with next time. Again! Always focus on success. Praise the heck out of there regulation and build them up. Kids thrive on repetition, praise, and an adult who cares.
- Play guessing games with your kids in the car. We love to play name that tune, find the alphabet, guess what I’m thinking and which way do we go. This helps them have a connection time with you and fills their cup so when you get to where you need to be there are fewer meltdowns and they feel secure because you’ve given them attention.
- Snacks! Buy a fridge organizer basket and keep after-school snacks in it that you can feel good about and that they like. My kids are always so hungry after school, play dates or even after playing outside. They can eat anything in that bin, but they do know to ask permission before they do. Win-win!
What are some life-hacks you have? Do you do any of the ones I’m doing? I’m always looking for ways to make my day go smoother, so share some of your goodness with me!