Back to Using Lists

My longtime readers may remember this post about how for me lists went from helpful tool to harmful crutch.

Well, after some time of not using any lists or calendars at home, I discovered that my newfound freedom was resulting in a little too much not-getting-stuff-done.

And so, I brought back a few of my lists, just updated.

Chore List
Same list, used slightly differently.
I still mark down the date when I do a chore, just not every. single. time. Prevously, if I did 3 loads of laundry in a day, I would mark it down 3 times. Now I just write down the date. It really does help me keep on top of how long it's been since I've done certain chores, and helps me keep the house maintained.

Grocery List
After one too many times of arriving home only to realize what I'd forgotten at the store, and one to many times of not having the coupon I wanted to use, it was starting to stress me out to not have a list, just knowing how much time & money I was wasting by not being organized. So the grocery list is back.

Chore Schedule
This is new to me, and still in the testing phase. I struggle so much with keeping our house together, that I thought I'd try one of the many house cleaning schedules I've seen online. The only problem was that all the ones I found were clearly geared towards SAHMs. So I printed out 4 of the most popular, marked down what they had in common, and prioritized tasks. I came up with 4 daily & 2 optional chores for each day, and made a calendar. Seemed doable enough.
Not so much. Yet. I think it needs... tweaking. I used it for a month with very limited success, modified it a little, and it went a little better last month. I think I'll still work on it. If I ever get to where I feel it's a really good, easy-to-keep-up-with system, I'll share.

Meal Planning Calendar
This one is coming back next week, and is primarily the result of me trying not to eat out as much. The truth is there are actually times when we eat out either because I can't think of what we might have to eat at the house, or because we've run out of  meals at the house. True story. So my meal planning calendar is coming back in an effort to help me prepare to eat in. I've changed it some from when I unsuccessfully used it before, so hopefully combined with my new incentive to eat in, I'll be able to tie it in to my grocery list and it will work some better.

So that's where I am. Threw away the crutches, but brought back some tools to (hopefully) help me keep my house running smoothly.

As always, thanks for checking in!