photo credit: angelocesare

I’ll just up and say it, because I hate those posts that build up a huuuuuge secret (to $1000 a month! to work-at-home secrets! to twice the productivity for half the effort! for perfect children! for great summer hair!) and then just let you down with something lame after you’ve made it through the whole-entire-not-really-worth-reading post.

The Big Secret to Getting Things Done as a Busy Mama

<drum roll>

People can wait.

People can wait without damage to their eternal well-being, developing psyches, or sense of relational importance.

Things can wait.

Things can wait without much damage at all to um, anything, including their non-eternal well-being.

The Right-Now Fallacy

Does Junior need his sippy cup right now? Does your best friend need you to return her call this very instant? Will the laundry disintegrate if it is not folded and put away immediately? (Regular scientific studies performed at my house say No, so you can breathe a sigh of relief on that one.)

The Right-Now Fallacy says

• if you don’t do it right now, it doesn’t count.
• if you don’t do it right now, the world will end.
• if you don’t do it right now, it means you don’t care.
• if you don’t do it right now, you’ll forget and never do it.

That little tyrannical monster looms big in our lives because we let it.

My husband will ask me to do something minor: return a call, schedule a get-together, sew on a button, pay a bill. And I think, for some reason, that I have to drop everything and do it right now. Which isn’t, as it turns out, what he means at all (most of the time).

My children will ask for a thousand hundred things in the course of a single moment, and they do mean right now.

Hold me, look at me, watch me, listen to me, help me, read to me, be with me, snuggle with me, get me a snack, get me a drink, get me some lunch, get me a treat, wash my hands, comb my hair, I need a ponytail, I need help with my shoes, I need to reach that toy on that high shelf that I will forget about approximately 20 seconds after you get it down for me, and so on.

Valid needs.

Who am I to discount the need to hold the tantalizing toy for 20 seconds? (Um, I”m the MOM, that’s who. But never mind. That’s not the point here.)

The point is, even very valid and real and important needs (snuggle! read! help! change diaper!) can wait for a little while without causing any major catastrophe. (IMPORTANT EXCEPTION: exploding diapers should be dealt with immediately or dire consequences will result. I am warning you, straight up, don’t wait around on those. IT GETS UGLY.)

The reason this is important…

(because I hear you, you’re probably all like Ummmmkay, how is this helping me to get things done?)

…well it’s like this.

Much of our frustration as busy mamas is due to the continual interrupting that is part of life with children (and, ahem, husband).

Now interruptions are not necessarily evil (that point could be argued), but the result is that we wander off to meet urgently expressed need without finishing or even wrapping up our current thing-in-progress, and by the end of the day we wander dazed through the house and see about fifteen dozen things-in-progress that we were never able to get back to doing all the way, and it is frustrating, disheartening, and overwhelming.

And we begin to resent those interruptions, and it is our own fault because, darn it ladies, we take them too seriously. And that is our own fault.

Try this and see how it effects your ability to get things done.

Next time you are interrupted, answer courteously with a “Yes, sure, I will be happy to take care of/help you with/draw twenty-seven blueredandpurplerainbows for/etc as soon as I finish this thing.”
Then: finish it.
THEN, and only then, go take care of the request-in-queue.

You already know the outcome, don’t you?

If you took the extra five or ten minutes to finish emptying the dishwasher, paying the bills, writing the article, playing the song on the piano, putting away the baby’s clothes, having the conversation with your sister, writing the note, mopping under the table, reading the chapter, editing the draft, or whatever it is, you wouldn’t have fifteen-leventy-dozen unfinished things at the end of the day.

And probably, nobody will be worse off for it.

Yes, of course there are exceptions. And yes, of course there is one valid danger that I admit to, the danger that you will completely and totally forget the request-in-queue while you are finishing the task at hand.
A real danger.
I have a solution for that, too, which I was going to write down as soon as I finished writing this… and, um, I forgot it…

Get back to you on that.

As I see it, there are four food categories that make the Christmas holidays different than the rest of the year. There is…

• social-event food, like the appetizer you’ll take to your sister’s open house or the pies you will make when you have the neighbors over for dinner
• big-family-dinner food, the traditional turkey-and-trimmings or your own version of what befits the holiday family meal(s)
• holiday food, like peppermint fudge and cookies
• gift-giving food, which could be a bottle of wine for a hostess gift or an elaborate arrangement of all those cookies and jars of preserves and summer sausages and your grandmother’s baklava. [I guess Harry & David falls into this category, but if you're giving food to me just go with one of the Etsy selections below (click a photo).]

I love food. I love holiday food, whether it’s candy corn in October, turkey and dressing in November, or cookies and spiced cider in December. The point is that the food requirements go up, way up, during these months. It can break your budget (over and over again) if you don’t do some planning ahead. Okay, it can break your budget if you do plan ahead. But at least it won’t be quite as bad, and you’ll be less stressed knowing you have what you need no matter how many last-minute things come up.

Step 1: Make a List of Pantry Staples

You may already have one, if you are an organized-shopping-list kind of person. Great, if so, move ahead to Step 2. If you don’t yet have one, think about the dry, canned, and frozen items you use often. Most of us tend to cook the same kind of things most of the time, so we purchase the same kind of grocery items repeatedly.

You can also make a separate section for fresh staples: items you go through regularly but don’t store for long periods of time. Bananas, bread, other fruit and vegetables, fresh herbs, juice, dairy products… which ones make your list every week?

RESOURCES

• Laurel Plum Online’s detailed and helpful guide to creation your own Custom Pantry and Grocery List. As she says, there are a plethora of Pantry Staples Lists out there online, but none of us cook exactly the same. I think probably most people don’t have fresh cilantro on their grocery staples list every single week… but I do.
• If you like reading pantry lists anyway, check out The Perfect Pantrys’ 23 pantry items you absolutely positively have to have. Then browse the website. Lots of fun pantry lists, recipes, etc.
• I put together a (short) list of freezer items to keep on hand for quick meals. It works for me. Check out Keep This in Your Freezer (And Save Dinner).

Step 2: Make a (Rough) List of Holiday Events Involving Food

And let me know if you’ll actually take part in any holiday events that don’t involve food. Do they exist? You don’t have to have your entire holiday calendar filled out, so don’t stress about this. Just jot down the things you know will happen at some point during the next few months.

My list: our annual chili party the day after Halloween, 2 birthdays, best friend’s weekend visit, big Thanksgiving dinner, Christmas parties (2), friends over (3), and big Christmas dinner. I’m roughly estimating on the parties and the friends coming over, but it gives me an idea. This isn’t perfection, this is just prep work.

Step 3: Make a (Rough) List of Holiday Food You Want to Make

This list may or may not correspond with the list above; that is, if you want to jot down specific ideas for specific events, have at it. If you want to keep it simpler and just note the things you know you want to make at some point, do that. Also on this list you should include the food gifts you want to give, whether it is a homemade item or a purchased item.

RESOURCES

• Oprah’s got a whole list: cookies, holiday recipes, menus, and more. The appetizers look good.
• I’ve got a Holiday Recipe Round-Up I put together last year, and if you’re looking for the perfect cheesecake recipe, it’s my sister’s. Get it, make it, and you’ll thank me later.
• From Real Simple, check out 12 Easy Recipes for Homemade Holiday Gifts. The Cranberry-Pistachio Biscotti sounds awesome (does it count as a holiday gift if I make it for myself?). Homemade Fudge Sauce? Yes. Yes, please. I’ll pass on the Cinnamon Twists, though. Not sure why everyone thinks puff pastry rolled in some random thing is a great gift, but whatever.
• Also from Real Simple, 24 Make-Ahead Thanksgiving Recipes, which can, of course, be used for holidays other than Thanksgiving. (Say, National Leprechaun Day….) The more you can make ahead, the better. I like the sound of that Goat Cheese Spread, the Cranberry and Orange Relish (it has cilantro!), and the Baked Spinach and Gruyere dish makes me drool.

Step 4: Clean Out Your Pantry

Before you start on this step, read the last line of Step 2 again. Say it to yourself as you clean out the old cruddy stuff, stack things back on the shelves, and wipe up the dirty spots. This isn’t perfection, this is just prep work. Don’t get caught up in alphabetizing spices or laying new shelf paper. Just get things in order. Clean out the out-dated, nasty, never-gonna-eat-it stuff. Wipe out the crumbs, spills, and messy spots. Stack like things with like: Baking Goods, Starches, Canned Goods, Snacks, Breakfast, etc.

RESOURCES

• Just read this one. You’ll laugh: How to Clean Out Your Pantry.
• CNN Living (because that’s where I go for homemaking advice, thankyouverymuch) provides a handy minute-by-minute speed-cleaning routine for getting the pantry whipped into shape.

Step 5: Start Adding To Your Normal List

From now on, every time you make your grocery list, you should pull your other three lists out and confer. Look at the sale flyers. What is on your list of staples, or an ingredient in one of your dishes, or a great deal for a main dish for that party you’re hosting?

Add it to your list, work within your budget, and get all the holiday food you can each shopping trip. You may want to grab some red stickers to mark the food that is to be saved for holiday use, or set aside a separate shelf or space in the freezer, if you have the room. Keep an eye for other items you might not have on your list. Are colored napkins on sale, or sparkling juices, or a specialty coffee that would be a great gift?

Remember, you don’t have to stress about preparation; you’ll be going to the grocery store again before you actually make all this food. And you’ll check your recipes and be sure you have all the ingredients. You will probably need to purchase more when you get to the time, but it will be far less than the full amount. Preparing your pantry spreads both the cost and the stress of holiday food out over a longer period of time, so you can enjoy the actual cooking and eating.

What you do or don’t do in the morning sets the tone and effects the outcome of the rest of your day. It’s not that you can’t recover from a difficult morning, but it’s much better to start the day off right than try to recoup what’s left of it. Our bad habits, lack of habits, lack of planning, lack of self-discipline, and over-achiever tendencies conspire against us to make mornings miserable. The way you handle your morning matters for the rest of your day, and since your life is simply the sum of your days, you could sum it up like this: how you handle the first few hours of your day says a lot about what your whole life is and will be.

Putting Yourself in Charge

Kids, oh kids, are naturally curious creatures whose brains, somehow, are reprogrammed every night during sleep so that they wake up with one question rattling around in their brains: who’s in charge today, me or Mom? Even the well-trained, well-behaved little people will still be testing the waters in their own small way. What’s Mom like today? Is she on top of things? Does she have a plan? Does she know what’s going on? Or is she groggy, distracted, and easy to manipulate? Can I get away with whining today? Can I get my own way?

Your kids are going to push you as far as they can. They are finding out where the boundaries are, if they still exist, if they’ve shifted. Too often my kids find me a little unsure and disoriented in the morning, so they sneak in a few runs past the normal limits. The rest of the day is me trying to re-establish where I want the limits to be. I would save myself a lot of trouble if I would just be clear, first thing in the morning.

Applying It

• Get up before the kids. I don’t think it matters if you’re dressed or not, but you need to be aware and awake, not groggy and disoriented and in that pre-coffee “Huh?” stage.

• Drink up! Eat up! Get some food and caffeine going and get yourself alive.

• Remind yourself of what is important for the day; take a look at your calendar, or your to do list from the day before.

• Don’t let them get away with line-crossing; if you deal with it immediately and effectively on their first attempt of the day, you’ll have less to deal with as the day goes on.

A Word About Morning Routines (less is more)

Morning routines are important: they provide a structure while you’re still half-asleep, so you can just move on auto-pilot and make sure you get breakfast ready, kids dressed, kids on bus, husband to work… or whatever your morning schedule looks like. However, I’ve noticed a lot of organizational/home-making sites can over-emphasize morning routines, and that often results in us creating over-complicated, over-zealous routines that just make us want to crawl back into bed.

For moms, especially for moms of young children who still require a lot of hands-on help, the simpler the morning routine, the better. Of course there are exceptions; if you’re a morning person and you really thrive on structure and detail, create a routine that fits your preferences. For me, I don’t want a 20-point list first thing in the morning. I try to accomplish what I can the night before and keep my morning as simple as possible. (Pssst… I don’t even write my morning routine down…).

Applying It

My simple morning routine looks something like this:

• Stumble to bathroom, take care of necessities, get dressed (my clothes are on the bathroom counter, usually, so I don’t have to think about that part)
• Get some coffee, load up Joe’s lunch bag, eat a banana
• Go to my office, Bible/journal, then work on writing projects until kids wake up (refill coffee as needed)
• Set out breakfast for the kids, take bottle to the baby
• Straighten my bedroom
• Change, dress, & feed baby, clean up kitchen
• Help kids get dressed, start the day

There are certain things you already do in the morning (breakfast, dress, take care of children) and making them deliberate – by putting them into a simple, repeatable routine – just puts you in charge.

Something to Look Forward To

I’m a morning person, but I still have a difficult time hopping out of bed when my alarm goes off. For you night people, I know it’s even harder. One tip: Reward yourself for getting up in the morning when you should (as opposed to sleeping in until the absolute last minute, then rushing around in a frenzy).

For me, the coffee and the quiet solitary time to write is a huge reward. My days are full and fun and busy with lots of teaching and talking and playing and working and coming and going; but I’m a person who recharges by being alone. The time in the morning for myself is sacred; it’s about God, it’s about me, it’s about my goals and passions. It’s not about my husband or the kids or the house.

Applying It

What makes it worthwhile for you to get out of bed? You introverts and writerly types might relate to my personal reward system; the rest of you will be thinking something like why would I get out of bed for that?

So you need to come up with your reward. It could be something cumulative (if I get up five mornings in a row, I get to buy a new purse..) but I think definite, immediate rewards work better: something you get as soon as you’ve accomplished the goal, so your sleep-deprived mind starts associating the good reward with the getting up out of bed. A great breakfast, a good cup of coffee, a morning walk, a new magazine or book waiting for you, a piece of chocolate, whatever. It doesn’t have to be big, but something you enjoy and look forward to and, preferably, something you can repeat every day as part of your morning routine.

Tips for Making Morning Easier

• Simplify, simplify, simplify. Make things easy on yourself.
• Hide the alarm clock in the next room so you have to get out of bed to turn it off. (If you can, put your reward within sight of it.)
• Put your clothes out in the bathroom. One less thing to figure out in the morning.
• Breakfast should be simple, easy, and require very little thought from you, unless you just enjoy cooking it. I don’t. I hate cooking breakfast (even though, in general, I love cooking.) So we eat simple breakfast: Joe often makes a smoothie for me and himself, or I just eat a piece of fruit or some yogurt. The kids get cereal or a piece of toast or oatmeal, with milk and a banana on the side. Simple, repetitive.
• Get your coffee ready the night before, so all you have to do is push the button; or get a programmable coffee maker so it’s already hot and ready when you get to the kitchen.
• Drink a big glass of water first thing, when you brush your teeth. It helps get your body energized and going, plus you need it after a night’s sleep.
• Try to pick things up the night before, get the dishes done, so you don’t walk into a mess. Nothing makes me want to go hide in bed more than a dirty kitchen and a messy house. Ick.
• Have a planner or list or calender out where you see it so you start thinking about your day, what’s ahead, what you’re excited about, what you want to accomplish.
• Turn on some music or talk radio so the silence doesn’t lure you back to sleep.

Relaxed Days

A note on sleeping in: I think sleeping in is great, sometimes. I love it when we have an open Saturday and we just kind of meander out of bed whenever (usually earlier than I want due to kids who wake up) and hang out in our pajamas. Sometimes I’ll choose to do that on a weekday, especially if it’s been a hectic or extremely tiring week already and we’re all worn out. There’s nothing wrong with choosing to move slow and be relaxed, and sometimes that’s exactly what we need. Choose your slow mornings deliberately. There’s nothing relaxing about oversleeping and then having to rush.
On weekday mornings, if you need a slower day but you still have to get people out the door, try going ahead and getting up as normal, going through your routine to get the necessities done, and then collapse on the couch with a movie and whatever kids are left at home with you. Or go back to bed, if you’re kid-free! That way you can enjoy your slower days, no guilt, no rush.

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Image by Lincolnian on Flickr.

Repetition does not make your life boring; repetition makes your life simpler. Conscious repetition helps you to accomplish the necessary and be freed up for the fun stuff.

Your Household Is Your Business

Think of your household like a business organization; how can you run a successful business if only the CEO knows the correct way to do things? That business is going to be extremely limited because there is no method to the daily work. No one can be trained or taught, nothing can be delegated, and even the daily, mundane tasks become a hassle because there’s no structure, no organization, no routine.

Sound like your house in the morning? Or the evening? Or anytime? (Except when you and the husband and the kids are all out of the house, right? Then it’s pretty peaceful…unless the dog gets loose… Oh, nevermind.)

Use Conscious Repetition

You know a morning routine makes your mornings easier. You know a daily minimum (which is also a routine) makes keeping the house clean a lot easier. Both routines are simply methods of conscious repetition.

Become conscious. You repeat things whether you’re aware of it or not. You shower, dress, eat, drive, email, hug, talk, sleep… repeatedly. Running your household requires infinite repetition; that’s one reason it’s so easy to get frustrated with the home and the family. It’s never done, complete, finished.

You never get to walk away from the laundry room, rubbing your hands together, and say, “Well, now that’s done for good I can move on to something more interesting.” Oh, no. The laundry will be back, again (and with a vengeance). The floor will get dirty, again. The kids will get hungry, again (what is with them?). You get the point.

So, your choice is to 1) waste time making the same decisions and fumbling your way through the endlessly repetitive and, let’s face it, boring daily tasks of modern home making or 2) create streamlined, custom methods to get the items accomplished quickly, efficiently, and as best suits you and the household.

Oh, hmmm, which sounds better?

Open Door #2! You win the prize: a simpler life, a smoothly running household, and more mental freedom and time to do… well, whatever you want.

Here’s How

Start writing things down. Notice what you already do and how you do it. Maybe set aside a little notebook or just jot things down in your journal or on your computer. What you want to pay attention to is the repetitive stuff.

Find a time to spend about an hour on creating some policies and procedures. This is the easiest and best way to get conscious repetition working for you.

A policy and procedure manual is a book (or books) that businesses use to set standards and define methods for their employees. It makes training easy and create common standards and methods that everybody in the company learns and uses.

A policy tells you what and why. A procedure tells you how.

Here’s an example from business.

Policy: An employee identification card is required for all employees in order to gain access to offices and facilities.

Procedure: Upon employment, the employee obtains the form from the Department of BlahBlahBlah, fills out, turns it in, and picks up ID card from the Office of ID Cards one week later.

Here’s an example from a household.

Policy: In order to be healthier, we eat smoothies for breakfast during warm weather seasons.

Procedure:

Annie purchases fresh fruit and frozen yogurt every week when grocery shopping.

Annie washes and prepares fruit to some extent when putting away groceries.

Annie puts some of the fruit in the refrigerator and some in the freezer so that there is always a frozen supply.

Annie processes any fruit that is about to spoil and puts it in the freezer.

Joe makes the morning smoothie by using fresh and frozen fruit, frozen yogurt, and juice.

Joe washes the blender and leaves it on the counter to dry.

Joe wipes off the counters.

Joe puts any fruit residue in the compost bucket.

Annie puts the blender away later in the day when cleaning the kitchen.

Mara takes the compost bucket out later in the day when playing outside.

Why Details Matter

Now you’re thinking, “Sheesh, that’s a lot of detail just to get a smoothie made.” Yes. It is. But it ensures that the smoothie gets made and the area gets cleaned up and it defines who is in charge of what.

It eliminates the decision-making process and the guess work: “Should I have a smoothie? Do we have any fruit? Is there any frozen yogurt? Did Joe clean the blender up? Should I make the smoothie today or will Joe do it?”

Can you switch it up? Sure! It’s your policy and procedure manual; you can do anything you want, including change it, ignore it, or light it up and watch it burn. It’s more useful, however, if you leave the matches alone and go ahead and get detailed enough to create some policies and procedures, then start using them.

If you’re the only one involved, you’ve just defined and streamlined your routine so it will go faster and you will be more efficient. If there are others involved, then you’ve made it easy for them to know what’s expected. That’s a relief for you and for them.

Image courtesy of D Sharon Pruitt.

Image courtesy of alicepopkorn.

Find out why it matters.

When I need help being consistent, say, with exercise or cutting out soda or eating more salads, I do research. I hope from site to site, reading up on fitness routines, muscle tone, great-looking salad ideas.

And nothing changes.

Then, as I walk the mall, dodging weed-thin teenagers and power-walking Mommies in velour sweats, I catch my own reflection. Sharp gasp (my own). Look of horror (my own). That’s not me: that’s some 30-ish woman who has a mummy tummy and flabby arms and doesn’t make that cute shirt look so cute.

I dump my soda in the nearest trash can, go home, and have a big salad for dinner. The next day I take a three-mile walk.

Change comes when it matters to me.

Image courtesy of apesura.

Call me shallow, but abstract health claims don’t grab my attention the way a glimpse of my own cellulite does. When it comes to making healthy lifestyle changes, my own image is my sticking point.

Should doesn’t matter.

Maybe I should be concerned about heart disease, diabetes, healthy muscles, strong bones. What actually does concern me is much simpler: having a double chin. Being able to button my pants. Having energy. When I get unmotivated, health research doesn’t help. A long look in the mirror does.

Put aside your idea of what you should motivate you. Motivation doesn’t matter unless it connects to your heart. If you don’t know why getting your life together matters, you won’t continue the process. Following any regime for the sake of regime alone is demoralizing and, ultimately, unproductive.

Find your sticking point.

So you probably already know what frustrates you most about your home, daily work, family, and lifestyle. Maybe it’s the clutter. The paperwork. The lack of communication. The lack of sleep. Let that sit for a minute and focus on something else:

What is the ideal?

Image courtesy of geishaboy500.

Picture an ideal space at home. Just one. The perfect, clean kitchen? The perfect work area? An ideal corner of the bedroom?
Picture an ideal moment from your workday or weekend. The moment you snuggle into bed for the night? The cuddles with your children? A hug from your spouse? A quiet moment with a cup of coffee?

Those pictures could be real or existing only in your imagination. Move through several mental pictures until your soup jumps a little at the idea of one particular, serene place or moment. Hold that.

What if you could create and multiply that feeling every day?

Changes that stick come around when you find something worth changing for. Frustration isn’t enough. You need an ideal.

When I try on clothes that don’t fit, frustration is only one half of the experience. The other half is the mental image I have of how good I could look. If I didn’t have the ideal, then the reality wouldn’t frustrate me so. There would be no disparity between what I have (or am) and what I want (or want to be). It’s the disparity that displeases.

Focus on the ideal.

Quit focusing on the negative side of that disparity and hold onto the ideal. Write it, draw it, collage it, meditate on it, blog about it, picture it. Let the images saturate your mind, and you’ll not only see clearly what you must change, you’ll also find the energy to make the changes, and make them last.

Finding the Household Rhythm

I found out that managing a household is different than doing certain jobs within the household. Much, much different. There was a certain rhythm to home, growing up, that I accepted and considered as automatic as day and night and the changing of the seasons. Those first few months with my own home, I learned that the rhythm isn’t automatic. Ours was very sporadic: bumpity bump bump bump, bumpity bump da da da da da da da zoooooom zoom collapse. (Something like that.) I looked for solutions. I compiled a massive household notebook, read books, made lists, and tried all sorts of methods for keeping things under control. I was still missing the main idea.

Running a household is a lot like directing a group of musicians. Some of us have four-piece ensembles, some of us have entire orchestras. Regardless of scope, however, one element must be in place to keep the others in sync: rhythm. I kept retuning my strings and adding trills to the flute solo when what I needed to do was give my big bass drum a steady beat: dum dum da dum, dum dum da dum, dum dum da dum, dum dum da dum.

Daily Routines are the drumbeat of the household symphony. You can make the beat as fast or as slow as fits you, but it’s got to be steady.

Create a Daily Routine

1. Figure out what needs to be done in your household on a daily and weekly basis.
   What areas of your household demand the most attention? These will be different for different homes, but usually meals, laundry, and cleaning are at the top of the list. Paying bills and dealing with household paperwork, doing yardwork, returning phone calls, handling social events, running errands, taking care of pets, personal care… Which ones belong to you? Which require daily attention? Which require weekly attention? (Don’t bother with monthly or seasonal tasks at this point.) Make a list, under Daily and Weekly headings, of all the things that must be done to keep your household running. Don’t overcomplicate or add in things that you would like to do but aren’t doing already. You want to keep this simple as you get started. You can always add more later.
2. Divide your task list into what should be done in the morning and what should be done in the afternoon or evening.
   Think about your schedule, your energy level, and your preferences as you make your division. Most of these items just need to be done at some point during the day or week, and the minute timing doesn’t really matter. So if you are working outside the home and have to rush to leave in the morning, don’t give yourself a 10-item list to complete before you go. Make your evening routine the longer one.
   If you stay at home and have more energy in the morning than the evening, then flip the two and do more in the morning and keep your evenings down to the minimum requirements. Work with what makes sense for you right now.

That’s all there is to creating the actual routine; here’s how to get yourself to make it a habit:

3. Don’t do daily what you don’t have to do!
   Keep it simple. If your morning routine takes an hour or more, you have too much going on. Put it on a diet. Simplify.
4. Don’t clutter it up with automatic actions.
   For example, you already brush your teeth every morning; you don’t need it on your list to remind you to do it. I remember one lady complaining about how long her morning routine was, and then I saw it: it included a whole section of items like “Moisturize face,” “Moisturize hands,” Moisturize elbows,” and “Moisturize legs.” If you have trouble remembering to put lotion on, then sure, add it to your list: but make it one item, not fifteen.
5. Complete your routine at the same times every day.
   Once you get in the habit, you can be more flexible about when you complete your routine; while you’re establishing it as normal, though, be a stickler for getting through it at the same time every day, or at least as close to the same time daily as you can. There will certainly be some exceptions. You can handle those. Just try to be as consistent as possible for the first 30 days.
6. Write your routine down and keep it handy.
   It doesn’t have to be fancy. Mine’s written on a piece of paper from my magnetic grocery list on the fridge and stays in my pantry, beside the coffee. That’s where I go first thing in the morning so it gives me an easy way to glance at it and remember where to start.
7. Keep your supplies in a convenient place.
   Any cleaning or other supplies you need for your routine should be right where you need them. The key to making the routine a daily no-brainer is keeping it quick and easy. So put a spray bottle of cleaner and a roll of paper towels in the bathroom and keep a mop in the kitchen, or whatever you have to do to make it happen.
8. Finally, be consistent.
   Maintain that daily, forward movement. Adjust your routine as needed – maybe you really don’t need to sweep the front porch every day – but don’t skip it or ignore it or forget about it. The more consistent you are, the easier it will become, and the more your household will just look like it runs itself. (We’ll know that’s not true, of course… it’s you directing the orchestra.)