Organizing Challenge, Week 9

I know, I know, I'm behind. But I really want to talk about my progress.

Schedule
For the last two weeks, I've been trying out my daily schedule (you can see that here). I started off like gangbusters. Making my goal just two activities in the morning (dishes and laundry) was genius (if I do say so myself). So easy and so freeing. That first morning, L woke us up at 5:45am and none of us got back to sleep (well T slept through it, thankfully). To say I was sluggish that morning would be an understatement. But as I was zoning out in the recliner, I felt at ease, no guilt, because I only had two things to do. And sure enough, I got moving in the late morning and the day was ultimately successful. Win!

Oh and I also found that on days where I got my two things done, productivity begets productivity. Win!

However: Thursday came around and I had planned that as my stay home/ignore T/get stuff done day. Fail. The weight of my assignment had me paralyzed. While I managed to eek out the Bare Minimum and a couple other things, "clean a bathroom" was not achieved. I realized this isn't going to work--I am too lazy, I need a new system and assigning myself a ton of tasks for one day just won't cut it. Back to the drawing board. (I will keep you posted.)

Okay so this week I gave up the idea of one crazy busy day and just went back to focusing on my big two--loading dishes and laundry in the morning. It was a busier week than average so that was a great way to keep me focused. That was a success. {I'm so glad this long week is over!}

Speaking of the Bare Minimum, I should probably mention another fail: the mail pile. I have not been conquering the pile daily and therefore my pile has been growing, growing, growing the past 2 weeks. Bad me! It's not just mail but papers from preschool and ads/coupons from the newspaper. At night I move the pile from my bed to the kitchen table {so I can sleep} and in the morning I move it from the kitchen table to my bed {so we can eat}. Fail.

Assignment
The assignment for week 9 was to put our weekly, monthly and occasional tasks into our schedules. Needless to say, if I can't manage my regular tasks, I'm not going to be managing occasional tasks until I generally get my act together. Again, I'll have to keep you posted. Fail.

Conclusion
Despite these failures, I still overall feel I'm making progress. Reminding myself to do my Big Two in the morning has been a revelation. Really, it's huge. Gets the day off to a good, productive start. And I always have clean dishes and bottles. Yea! So I'll be focusing on that and hopefully I'll build some momentum so that adding in "clean a bathroom" isn't life-shattering.

Thank you again to Brenda for coordinating this project. Head over to Unsolicited Advice to see more One Year to a {More} Organized Life.