Tweaking My Morning Housework Routine

For the past several months, I've been working on my morning work routine in the house. I've got my personal self-care/quiet time set, so it's really been about trying to streamline and order my cleaning, organizing, and gardening jobs with the goal of greater productivity and freeing up more time in the afternoons for special projects, deep-cleaning jobs, or focused work. 

I was never an organized kid, teen, or young adult. When I started a family I felt like I was starting completely from scratch and flying blind. My mother had already passed away, so I felt I had no one of which to ask questions. Blogs (and the internet as we know it) didn't exist. I read a few books from the library. But still, figuring out this whole "be organized and get work done efficiently" thing was difficult for me. So I'm always on the lookout for other's ideas about their morning housework routines. 

These are the tasks that I try to get done everyday in the morning hours:

• clean up the kitchen from breakfast, start the dishwasher
• make the bed, tidy the bedroom
• pick up stuff from other rooms and put where belong
• get a start on dinner, at the least pull items out of freezer/set pantry items on counter, harvest garden produce needed for dinner
• tackle 1 cleaning job (bathrooms, dusting, vacuuming, fridge, windows/mirrors) 
• do laundry, declutter one small area, start bread/yogurt, or take out trash from bathrooms/bedrooms/office

I am in the process of determining the best order for performing these tasks. But I do get them done.

What I'd like to start doing on a regular basis:

• when cleaning up the kitchen from breakfast, I'd like to do a quick check on fridge contents to ensure I use up or freeze leftovers
• spend 15 minutes before making lunch planning out my afternoon projects
• I'd like to move my daily walk from afternoon to morning

I'm not sure when I'll fit my daily walk in. Currently, I walk sometime after lunch. However, that eats into my project time. So moving that to the morning might really help me. The other two items I'll just have to remind myself to do.

Are you naturally organized? How has your morning work routine evolved? What housework tasks do you try to get done first thing in the day? Are there any tasks you'd like to add to or delete from your pre-lunch or pre-paid work routine? I just want to say thanks in advance for all who add their input here. I am still trying to figure out what will work for me.

Just Another Day (Weekend) in the Frugal Life

I watched a rerun of a 1970s TV show for free on Daily Motion on my laptop instead of a paid streaming service. And we watched a dvd from our local library on family night, again for free (while munching on homemade pepperoni pizza).

As we no longer have an endless supply of plastic grocery bags (bag ban Oct 2021), I lined the household trash bins with plastic and paper mailers this week. The large ones are great for the kitchen and the smaller ones work in bathrooms, bedrooms, the office and the car.

I repaired the mesh sieve. The screen material had come away from the frame. I tucked the mesh back into the frame with the pocket knife and clamped it down with pliers. I hope it holds. But I can always repair it again.

I used what we had on hand to make Valentine's Dinner. I actually tried to buy fresh strawberries to go with dinner, but our local stores were sold out of fresh strawberries by Sunday afternoon. So, for dinner I made egg and vegetable fried rice, pot stickers, steamed broccoli, and tofu-chocolate whip for dessert. The dessert has only 3 ingredients -- chocolate chips, tofu, and vanilla extract, which I already had.

My daughter gave me these great little snack containers so I can my own little snack packs. I'm a big fan of dividing snacks and treats into single portions so I can control how much I eat at one time. These snack containers will let me put together protein and veggie or dried fruit snacks for myself. The grocery store sells tiny protein snack packs for about $1.39 each. I think I can do my own for less with these containers. Sometimes, special money-saving gadgets are a waste of money. But sometimes they really do save. I think these containers will fall under the heading of those that do save.

I froze 2 very dark bananas to make banana bread when we are all out of treats.

I split open the toothpaste tube to get every last bit out.

I used half a box of hair coloring to touch up my roots and temples, saving the other half to use next month. I had saved the applicator bottle from the previous month (washed out) for mixing half of each of the components. Afterward, I washed out the bottle and the plastic gloves for reuse next month with the other half of the box. I've been doing this for several months and haven't needed to do a full head coloring since sometime in fall.

So tell me, what were the highlights of your day (or weekend) in the frugal life?