Sunday To-Do List and Finding Down Time

I found myself fretting on Saturday night, realising that I had been busy with family and had allowed my chores to stack up. I often find that Sunday turns into a chore marathon, with me trying to get everything done before the weekend is over and in time for everyone to be ready for school and work. In the end I listed everything I needed to do, whether mundane, important or the sillyand put it on my bedside table so that I could get it out of my head and get some sleep.

 I have used various planners over the year to plan my time, sometimes in am/pm blocks, sometimes by the hour so that every activity has a time and gets done. But on this occasion I found that there is nothing like a messy to-do list with everything dumped on it and starting with some big wins. By that I mean, taking the hardest thing or the one you dread the most and getting it out of the way. This gives you a sense of achievement and you get some of the big things out of the way. I started with the bathroom, laundry and cleaning before I stopped for breakfast with the kids.

The girls opted for festive plates and Gorgeous ate breakfast while he watched The Blue Planet, a BBC documentary for his school project on the oceans.

Something else I found helps to get things done without getting too fed up, is taking breaks to do something nice. In this instance I made the kids a nice breakfast and sat down to savour my morning coffee. I also lit a candle so that my room would smell nice while I hid there for some quiet time.

























I got on with my list until midday when my best friend popped in for a visit and treated me and the kids to lunch. She came by with this gorgeous cake which had all the kids asking if it was my birthday:

We did some grocery shopping and some gift shopping together before she headed off and I went back to my list. I got most of it done in time to take a break and hang out with Little Lady and watch a series she wanted to catch on Netflix whilst the babies were napping. We managed to waste time and eat too many sweets. I should really have been blogging and catching up with e-mails, but I find building in down time and some fun stuff in amongst all of the busy-ness of your day makes the chores and work so much more palatable.

I managed to get to the end of the day, with still ironing to do, school bags and PE kits to pack and left over items from the to-do list. I still ended up in bed later than I had planned, but for a change the house was clean, we were ready for the next day and I was not exhausted or fed up.

(my to-do list at the end of the day and after the babies got their hands on it).