Episode 46: Keeping Life on Track: My 5 Favorite Routines for Working Mom Life
ITUNES | SPOTIFY
In this episode, I'm pulling back the curtain and sharing the five essential routines that help me maintain life during busy seasons like "Maycember." These are my ride-or-die systems that keep life running smoothly when our schedules get hectic, I have very little energy, or something unexpected pops up. I'm sharing exactly what these five routines are and what they look like in my everyday life so that you can try one (or more) of them out for yourself! Simple routines and systems create predictability, reduce decision fatigue, and help you get things done with as little energy as possible.
And if you're ready to create routines that make your life easier, whether at home, for work, or to take better care of yourself, I can help. Head to www.themothernurture.com/applicationication to learn more about working together to create a working mom life where you're confident in your decisions, content with how you're using your time, and taking care of yourself.
links & resources mentioned in this episode:
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You are listening to the Life Coach for Working Moms podcast, the show where we are talking about what it actually takes to make life work as a working mom. I'm your host, Katelyn Denning, a full time working mom of three and a certified life and executive coach. I'm so glad you're here and I hope you enjoy this week's episode.
Hello, and welcome back to another episode of the podcast. I am so happy that you're here with me today. Last week we talked about Maycember. It's a busy season for many of us right now. I actually got a mini reprieve this past weekend, one that I wasn't expecting. It felt sort of like a snow day in a way though.
Snow days can definitely be stressful when you have school aged kids who are surprise home with you. But it had that vibe of like. We're planning for a big, busy day, or you're planning for the school day when you were a kid, and then surprise. School's canceled and you get to stay home. Well, it has been just nonstop raining here where we are, and so all of our soccer games for all three of my kids were canceled this weekend.
And while we couldn't do a lot of yard work or spring type projects, we enjoyed a little bit of. Bonus time. I did go over to one of the local nurseries that is well known for their vegetables and herbs and those types of plants. And we had so much fun reading through all of the descriptions of what felt like a hundred plus tomato varieties.
We got some. Herbs. We're gonna try a couple of pepper plants this year. So that was a lot of fun and something that I didn't think we'd get to do. So love when that happens. And now we are back at it and another week a lot of other tasks and events and activities going on, but we're doing it.
So today I wanted to talk about routines and pull the curtain back on a few of the routines that in my life have been my steadfast, making sure that life continues to operate, ride or die routines, and especially during busy seasons like Maycember. Or just a season where the schedule is really full or where everyone seems to be getting sick all of the time, or you have all of those unexpected things pop up, like something breaks around the house or a last minute trip or project deadline, and it's sort of all hands on deck to focus on that thing.
Those are the times when routines are so crucial, when they are more important than ever. I think routines are also really important, not just during the busy seasons, but also if you think of those times when your energy is really low. So sometimes it might be because you are sick or, I don't know.
I go through seasons where I just. Don't have it in me to do a lot of extra things. And even though we know that whatever season we're in that it is just a season though, I think it can be easy to forget that. So if you need to hear that again, let me say it. This is just a season and all seasons do pass.
But it can be hard to get things done when your energy is low, when the schedule is insanely full, when everyone is sick, when there are these unexpected things that pop up, and yet things still need to get done. As much as I would like, or you would like to just hit pause, take the week off, let things go until life calms down or it goes back to quote unquote.
Normal though, what is a normal week? Really, life does go on and work, and the house and our kids, they don't take care of themselves. There are things that still have to be done, and so. Those routines and those systems in those moments are really there to help us pick up the slack, to be that safety net, that at a bare minimum, these things are still getting done.
They're still getting taken care of.
When I help a client set up routines and systems around the house. Or in work really. I mean, we cover it all routines to help you get ready for bed at night routines to help you move your body more consistently, to drink water to meal plan, to plan your week to make progress on your work projects, whatever it is.
When I help a client set these up. It is with the goal of freeing up more time, freeing up energy and to again, make sure that the basics still get done, that things still move forward even when life is busy. Work is busy. You don't have the time and you don't have the energy. In seasons when you are just trying to survive, right? The routines just get the basics done. But in seasons when. You're not just trying to survive. Our routines are still there and they get to help us
Create extra time and energy that can be used for something more fun. For enjoyment, for relaxation, the routines continue on. I like to think of them as the gentle undercurrent that flows beneath everything else that's happening in our day-to-day life. The unexpected, the one-offs,
the routines are just there consistently, steadily moving us forward, getting those basics done. And again, in seasons where you're not just surviving, they give you that energy for other things. So if you can't tell, I'm a huge fan of making sure that the areas of your life that can be put into a routine, that can have a system around them that can be optimized, are optimized.
So that the parts of life that we don't want to put on autopilot, that you have the time and the energy to actually be present for those. So today I wanna share with you five. I have many more than five, but I wanna share today five of my, again, steadfast ride or die favorite routines that have been helping me through all of the seasons, the easy ones, the ones where I'm just tired and exhausted with no energy to spare , the seasons of survival and the ones for enjoyment.
All right, so here we go. Let's get into my five. And I would love to hear which of these, , do we share? Do you do any of these as well? In your day-to-day life? Are you gonna try one of these out? Or what am I missing? What else do I need to try? I'm game for anything that I can make a little bit easier.
So the first routine , is. Actually setting meal themes for what we're going to eat as a family throughout the week. I have talked about this and coached on this for years now, and all of these routines really come down to removing. Extra decisions. We make enough decisions. I don't want you to have to think about things in the moment.
I just want you to know because you've decided in advance, and so meal themes do that for you. Instead of sitting down to choose out the meals that your family is going to eat this week, and looking at a huge list of all of these options, a meal theme reduces the options. Instead of choosing from everything, you're just choosing from within the soup category, or you're just choosing from one of your five go-to pasta recipes,
or you know that pizza is every Friday and tacos are every Tuesday. My themes rotate depending on the season. I've been sharing a lot lately that I am in the season of the sandwich theme. So actually two of our nights during the school week are. Some sort of sandwich because it is the fastest and easiest thing that we can all eat before we have to head out for all of the extracurricular activities and events that are happening this spring.
So heavy on the sandwiches, that will not be that way. Starting next month when we release soccer, we're out of school, all of those things. But I'll just give you some examples of the themes that I have used and rotated in and out depending on the season. So soup is a great one. We always would do soup Monday during the winter, taco Tuesday, or some sort of variation of nachos or enchiladas or salsa verde chicken, something like that.
That is Taco Tuesday themed. I've done a chicken theme. And it could be anything in the chicken category, kebab, some sort of sheet pan thing. Roasted chicken thighs. Who knows? You can choose. A pasta dish. We tend to do pasta toward the end of the week because it's easier. I get tired. My energy starts to dip by Thursday, so some sort of pasta, whether it's spaghetti and meatballs, or a chicken pasta or a veggie pasta.
it doesn't matter as long as there's pasta involved. Pizza Friday, forever and ever. Always. I know. I'm not alone in that one. Friday night is for pizza, a movie night. I've done seasons where we'll do a rice dish or it'll be something on the grill. I. There are so many options, but it's just thinking about what are the types of foods that we eat regularly and can I just assign a theme to a day?
Saturdays for us have consistently been a leftovers or takeout night, something easy, and then Sundays we go in and out of seasons where Sunday is either a. Heavier lift recipe, something that takes longer. It's a time to try a new recipe. Or if the kids wanna help and take charge in the kitchen, that can be their night as well, because we typically have more time.
So again, choosing a theme for the season for each night of the week is a routine that I love and just makes choosing out our meals and recipes so much faster, so much easier. All right. The second routine that I love is about cleaning up after dinner. So. I remember seeing this years ago on some Instagram account about how putting on music when it is time to do a family cleanup or for everyone to pitch in with their chores, whatever that looks like, that it just creates this atmosphere of it being a little bit more fun.
It feels a little bit more like a party and everyone is involved in it together because we're all listening to the same music. Well, I have taken that and really used it. Consistently for years now, we don't always have music on. My kids these days are just so loud. Anybody else's kids just talking all of the time, singing, you know, making jokes, all of these things.
Sometimes I put the music on to drown that out, but other times that is the soundtrack. Either way. The routine and the pattern that we are in right now is that everyone pitches in and cleans up after dinner. Music is a bonus. So , this routine is about ensuring that my husband and I are not the only ones resetting our first floor each night.
So. In whatever way my kids can, what is age appropriate? We're all clearing the table. We are putting the napkins in the bin to be washed after dinner and loading dishes into the dishwasher or putting things into the sink. We are all picking up and putting away the toys and the papers and the book bags and the shoes and whatever didn't get put away earlier to reset that first floor.
And then. I care the most about wiping down the table encounter, so I come along behind everybody as they clear the surface and I wipe it down and playing music. Whether we take turns choosing what song or which record gets put on or not, it just makes it fun and again, creates that team atmosphere and is just the family culture that I want to create.
So I love that one. And it is now just expected that after dinner we're all pitching in to clean up and reset the first floor. My. Favorite routine and one that I do not even want to think about what our kitchen would look like if this were not in place. It is to run the dishwasher every night. I'm sure many of you do this as well, but I also talk to many people who do not do this, and running the dishwasher is more of a sporadic affair.
And if that works for you, by all means, keep going. It does not work for me. And I love the consistency of knowing that every morning I'm opening up a dishwasher that is clean. We can put the dishes away and then start loading with breakfast all through dinner that day. All of our dirty dishes into the dishwasher,
so it saves our kitchen. We set it on a delay start so that it. Runs overnight. So even if we're finishing cleaning up the kitchen at say, seven o'clock at night, I know that somebody's gonna grab another cup of water. We might be doing a later snack, or my husband might be munching on something in the evening when he stays up late, that those dishes can still get put into the dishwasher as long as the person remembers to hit the button again to reset it.
But then it runs overnight while we're sleeping and we wake up to clean dishes, my kids share the chore of emptying the dishwasher, and we do that while everyone is down getting breakfast and packing lunches. And even if the dishwasher isn't entirely full, we still run it. Without this routine, I fear our sink and our counter would be overrun with dirty dishes, and I do not have the energy for that.
So the predictability, again, of just knowing what that cadence is, is one thing that I don't have to think about, and it helps our sink and our counter stay relatively clear of dirty dishes.
My next favorite routine. This is one that I always share in beyond balance as well, but I'm giving it to you here and that is the delay start on our laundry. If you have a newer washing machine, ours is probably coming up on seven years old , and mine has this option, but if you're somewhere in that range, check right now to see if yours in the settings section of your washer if it has a delay start button.
So just like the dishwasher and having that predictable cadence, it is so much easier I find to load up the washing machine at night with a load of laundry. It can be, again, part of that cleanup routine as you reset the first floor or something you do before bed and then set it to wash in the early morning hours, or at least that's what I like to do.
I'll give you another scenario here in just a minute so that when you wake up. The laundry is clean. It's wet. It's in the washer, but it's clean. All you have to do then is transfer the clothes to the dryer before you head out the door for daycare drop off or school drop off, or go to the office. If you go to the office, or even just work from home.
It's drying during the day. No more leaving the wet clothes and the washing machine all day, where they start to smell funky. The laundry just moves through that cycle each day with very little effort because of the timing and the predictability of using that delay start. Now I have another client who I.
Likes to have it set so that it is done washing by the time she gets home from work and as a part of their get home and get unpacked and settled for the evening routine, she's moving it over to the dryer and then pulling it out before bed. It could also look like that. Maybe you load up the washer in the morning as a part of your morning routine.
You can tweak it to fit into your day as you like. But this for me at least, ensures that the laundry hampers are never to a point of overflowing. I'm not digging through them for clothes that I need to wear, but that are still dirty, and each day there's a load that's moving through the wash. Some people like to have a specific,
type of load that they're washing each day for that detailed of a schedule. I don't necessarily need that, but if you do, that's great. Another routine that you could put in place. And then for me, I carry those clean and dry clothes upstairs to the room where they need to be put away. And during bedtime routine, while my kids are brushing their teeth or.
You know, as my husband's maybe doing, reading the books that night, I will sit on the floor and fold the laundry and put it away. And so even when we're super busy and we have a lot going on, laundry is still getting done. If you wanna deep dive on Laundry hacks, you can check out episode eight of the podcast.
My last fifth and favorite routine that has saved me all of these years is to create a bedtime routine for you.
I have a whole podcast episode on morning routines. It's actually called The Truth About Morning Routines for Working Moms. It's episode 18. I'll put a link to it in the show notes as well. I've always thought that morning routines are challenging, especially for those of us. Who are working with small children, it is hard to be consistent when you have kids who are early risers or a newborn who's still up at night, or, I mean, mine aren't young, young, but I still have one of my three.
It's just not a consistent sleeper, and so. Morning routines can be hard, but I have found that an adult bedtime routine is more life giving and more realistic in terms of spending a few minutes each day focused on me. So whether your bedtime routine includes stretching or a short meditation or journaling, or just reading a book, doing a puzzle or a crossword puzzle or listening to music.
It really doesn't matter what you do as long as you feel. Relaxed and enjoy doing it. So my bedtime routine has changed throughout the years and in the different seasons of life, but I have consistently taken at least 10 minutes before bed to finish off my day focused on myself. I can rely on that more than I can rely on a consistent morning routine.
So. Today, in this season, even though we are in an extremely busy month right now, before bed, I will, well, I get myself into my pajamas, wash my face, and brush my teeth at the same time that my children do. So that part is at least done. Then whether I go downstairs for something else, I do a little bit of work, which sometimes , is just required
At the very least, I read. A chapter before I fall asleep. Many times I read more than that. You know, that I love to read. I'm reading lots of books, these days, but at the very least, I've given myself a little bit of time to read, relax, unwind, and I've brushed my teeth, washed my face, and I've put on pajamas that I love.
So what could that look like for you? And even in the busy seasons when you feel tired or like you don't have a lot of extra time, can you do that for yourself? So those are my five favorite routines. Again, I'll run through them. Meal themes. Music and a routine of cleaning up and resetting the first floor every night, running the dishwasher every night, so it's clean in the morning.
Using delay start on my laundry, so a load is going through the cycle every day and then having at least a 10 minute bedtime routine for myself. You will know a routine is working well for you if it's happening consistently. So I always say more days than not, we are not about perfection over here, but you're doing something consistently without much thought or effort.
Right. I don't have to think about setting the dishwasher. I just do it, or the laundry or reading before bed, or choosing our meals based on our themes. The only time that routine should take effort is when they're either new. So if you're establishing a new routine, you have to remember set reminders for yourself.
It takes some effort to do that, or. Your routine needs to change. So if it is taking effort and time, it's likely that the routine is a little bit off. Maybe your circumstances have changed, your life has changed, the season has changed, and this routine probably no longer fits and is no longer helping. So something is off here and is worth examining.
It can be helpful to have someone with that outside fresh perspective. Take a look at those routines, whether it's one that you feel like is off and is not working, or just an area of life where you know, a routine could help you so much, but you're not quite sure what it is or could be, or how it would look, or how to get started with it.
I can help you with that, whether it is a routine that we're setting up for some of those basic chores , and things that need to get done around the house. Whether it's a routine that helps you in your work be more productive and more efficient, or a routine that supports you like drinking water or getting some movement in on a regular basis or more sleep.
These are the types of things that I support my clients with. Again, both in establishing, maintaining, and updating routines. If you would like to learn more about what it could look like to work together on routines and so much more.
To create a working mom life that really works for you, where you feel confident in the choices you're making, and content with how you're spending your time and making progress on your goals and taking care of yourself. You can head to my website, themothernurture.com/apply. You'll answer a few questions about what your working mom life looks like for you today, and I will follow up with more information about coaching and my ideas for a plan that could help you get to where you want to be.
. Again, you can head to themothernurture.com/apply for all of the notes and links that I mentioned today in the podcast. You can grab all of that and more at the show notes themothernurture.com/podcast. And if you like today's episode, please subscribe. Share it with a friend, a working mom colleague that you know, or leave me a rating and review. I so appreciate you being here. All right with that, I will talk with you in the next episode and until then, take care.
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