F is for ........ Finding My Feet!

This post is part of A-Z all about me {weekly blog challange} over at 'Love Kate'!

My last post reflects a little with how I am feeling right now. I am in the process of making changes in our lives and home to make things work better for us.  I have been feeling so anxious and stressed with my growing to-do-list that I had to take the time to work out what was and wasn't working for our family.

I am a naturally creative and organised person and we all know how much extra pressure this can add to our days with 3 million new ideas floating around our heads at any given moment.  And with being organised can come added pressure and anxious feelings when the house isn't exactly the way we want it to be ..... with a busy family, this sometimes isn't possible.

I have taken the time to have long chats with my good friends and asked about how their lives are structured to see if there were any ideas that I could implement to make it easier for us.  Let me just say, I have some very wise friends and I feel better after a good chat!

The changes I have made so far are working for us and I'd thought I would share a few here along with some things we have already been doing:

• Cooking dinner in the morning.  This has helped me immensely.  I no longer have that crazy time at 5 pm trying to think of something to cook for dinner.  During the evening kitchen clean up I have been cutting up everything I need to cook dinner the next morning.  That way when in the morning I am really only cooking it as I have already taken the time to prepare everything I need.
• Making school/kindy lunches the night before.  During the evening kitchen clean up I make the lunches.  If I need to I will pop some eggs on the stove too or any other items I need to cook for lunches the next day.
• Packing the school/kindy bags each night.  I make sure the kids have everything they need just sitting ready on the bench for them to grab in the morning.  This involves school banking, library books, any payments that need to made to the school for excursions and homework.
• Sunday session.  Most Sundays we usually do something as a family.  But by doing anything extra I can on a Sunday afternoon/evening I have found my Mondays just work out that much better.  This includes anything from a throwing on a load of washing and hanging it out at night, making a list for the next week, or spending even one hour doing a quick tidy up around the house. Monday mornings now seem to start off much better and I feel more energised to begin the week.
• Having set work days.  Now this one has taken me a while to get my head around.  And it is still a work in progress.  But I have had to make set work days for my business and set days I have just for the kids, housework, playdates, appointments and any errands I need run.  Not having set days just threw me into a constant state of guilt.  When I was spending time with the kids or doing housework I was feeling guilty and anxious about not working on my business orders and the same thing was happening when I was was working on my business, I felt like I wasn't doing what I needed to do. And that is first and foremost a Mum.

As I go through more changes {no not the change of life},I will try to share them here.  I would love to hear any more tips you may have that work for your family too.

Now excuse me while I go find my feet!

These cute ones are Mia's not mine ;)