Coupon-Clipping Your Daily Tasks: How to Save Time with Organization
Few things can frazzle a parent like the craziness of their day-to-day schedules. From work responsibilities to PTO meetings, ballet lessons to baseball practice, parents can feel like pulling their hair out with all of the running they have to do every day. It’s very easy to feel like you have spent your entire day on the go with little to show for it except utter exhaustion as you crash into bed to do it all over again the next day.
They say the heftiest price tag in life lies in the time we spend on the things we do, so perhaps it’s time to start discount shopping our overall task time. Think of it as coupon clipping for five minutes off your morning routine or ten minutes saved during meal time. Sound like something you could get behind? Us too. So, we’ve scoured the net for some seriously ingenious hacks to help coupon-clip your daily time-spent “expense” down to a more affordable time budget for you. Who knows – you might even be able to get things down enough to have that well-deserved “me time!” (There’s always hope, right?)
“Good organizational systems have a way of making time fall into place: Kids find more time for fun and families find time to be together.” – Evelyn Porreca Vuko for Parenting.com
With time at a premium then, we’ll get right down to business! After extensive research, here are some of our favorite tips and tricks to shave off some time from your daily routines:
1. Snack and Meal Prep
While this may sound like something you’ve heard before, we’d like you to take this one a step further. Shop for items that are pre-packaged or easily broken down into separate baggies. Pre-cut veggies and fruit work great for this, as do almond snack-packs and string cheese. Buying items that are easily broken down into individual containers will allow you to meal and snack prep with quickness and ease. Break down the kids’ snacks in single-serve baggies. When they want a snack, they can grab it without bugging you. Make some lunchmeat or PB&J sandwiches and package them in baggies for the week so when it’s time to make lunches you can simply grab a baggie of fruits, a sandwich, and some veggies and you’re done. Want to go even further? Put cereal into Tupperware bowls and set them out with milk in a smaller container (easier for them to handle) and let the kids handle their own breakfasts every morning.
2. Reminder Bracelets
Pretty much every parent on the planet understands the frustration of learning their darling little one forgot (again) to hand in a permission slip in class that day or bring home the details for their upcoming project. We found this cool way to help remind them they need to do something in class by way of reminder bracelets. Simply, reminder bracelets are strips of paper with a note written on it for whatever you need them to do, stapled or taped around their wrist as a reminder to them to take care of things before they leave school that day. We’re also pretty sure they won’t like wearing them long either, so they’ll likely take care of whatever it is first thing in the morning, so, bonus, right?
3. School Stations
One idea we came across that we absolutely love is the idea of creating a media center, or school station of sorts, in one common area near the main entrance to your home. This should be a desk or table equipped with a place to put homework folders for checking, a place to hang book bags, a basket for anything that needs signed, and even a place for borrowed items like library books so they don’t get mixed in with other items from home and lost forever. The concept here is to make kids empty their bags when they get home and learn to put things where they go – which also gives them a reminder of things that need done that night like homework or permission slips for signatures.
4. Night-Time Prep
By the time you reach their bedtime each night, things should be pretty well done for the day. Especially if you participated in the earlier meal-preps and school station breakdown. But to save additional time in the morning (and we all know how much smoother our days go when our mornings are less hectic), spend a few minutes with the kids before bed getting their things ready for the next day. Go through the school station to make sure their bags are packed up again and ready for the next day. Lay out clothes for them (or have them pick out clothes and lay them out if they’re older), and get lunches packed with the easy-to-grab baggies you did earlier, then store it in the fridge for a grab-and-go in the morning.
5. Digital Family Calendar
For most, keeping a calendar of appointments and schedules is simply a requirement. Many of us would be completely lost without it, but sometimes it’s still difficult to stay on track. Why? Well, because not everyone can see the schedule or know when to be prepared for certain upcoming events. How do we fix it? Well, we are in the tech age here, right? Create a digital family calendar that is shared with all family members (with tech gadgets, of course) that everyone can access and add to. This helps everyone to stay on the same page and avoid the dreaded, “why didn’t you tell me your project was due in the morning?” conversation. Stay on top of it – help the whole family to stay on top of it – with a shared calendar.
There you have it! Coupon clipping done, and your time budget should feel a few minutes lighter each day!
© Novis River Inc. and Zedbud, [2020]. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this site’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to [Novis River Inc.] and [Zedbud] with appropriate and specific direction to the original content.
