My Morning Routine - and a 20 day challenge!

Good Morning! I am participating in a challenge set by The Organised Housewife. The challenge is called 20 Days to Organise and Clean your home. I'm quite excited to be involved, because while my house is clean and tidy (thankyou routines!) I do need help in organising some things. I mean, I know where everything is in my house, it's not that I'm disorganised at all, but after I finish cleaning up, I seem to have a pile of 'stuff' that I need to keep, but doesn't really have a home. I'm interested to see some of the ideas Katrina has, and how I can perhaps apply them in my house. Plus, it's always great to see other people's methods of cleaning and tidying, because you might just find something that works wonders for you! 

The 'pre challenge' tasks started 2 days ago, but the actual challenge doesn't begin until Monday next week. Once you subscribe (it's free!), Katrina from The Organised Housewife sends you an email each day giving you your daily task with a link to her blog post on that task. In 20 days (4 weeks, because you don't receive tasks on the weekend) your house will be clean, tidy and you will have some organised routines in place. It's not too late to sign up, so what are you waiting for ? You can sign up by clicking on the button in the sidebar, or at the bottom of this post.


So, today the task is about establishing a morning routine. Lucky for me, this isn't really a 'task' as such, because I have a good routine in place. But reading back over a post where I've talked about routines, I realise I haven't discussed the morning part of my routine in any great detail. So, today is a good day to do that, don't you think? Here is what my morning routine looks like:


6:00am - My alarm goes off and I get up to have my shower and get dressed. 

6:20am - I head into the kitchen and make the school lunches if I didn't do it the night before and begin unloading the dishwasher.

6:30am - I wake the big kids so they can get dressed for school, then go back to the kitchen to start their breakfast and finish unloading the dishwasher.

6:45am - Kids eat breakfast. I click the kettle on and get tea/coffee ready for me and hubby while he gets showered/dressed for work.

7:00am - Big kids pack their school bags, brush their teeth and make their beds while I get the little kids dressed and stack the breakfast dishes into the dishwasher.

7:10am - Free time to read/watch tv for big kids (or if they're dawdling it gives them some time to catch up). Some play time for little kids. I sit down with hubby and have a coffee. I'll also put a  load of washing into the machine to start. 

7:30am - Walk out the door to drive hubby to work and the kids to school. 

8:10am - Run any errands or go to the supermarket to pick up anything I may need.

9:00am - Come home and start my housework, put dinner into the slow cooker (if I'm slow cooking that night!) or chop vegies. Later in the day I take my little daughter to preschool, so I try to get most things done in the morning. Day carries on as usual.

And that's it! I probably don't need to wake so early, but I like to make sure I have time for a coffee in the morning, and if I need to iron a uniform or make lunches then it gives me time to do that too. Plus I love not having to rush or rush the kids! It works well for us, so I will continue with it for the time being. 

Feel free to link up  your morning routine! And don't forget to join the challenge! I'll be blogging about my progress as I go along :)


Nadia
xxx