Since having kids I have developed a Sunday routine, without even really consciously thinking about it. What I mean by that is I didn’t sit down and say to myself “Come on Morgan, sort out your Sunday night routine out”, because – well it’s Sunday. I’d never really given it much thought. While I don’t claim to have anything special figured out, I can be just as frazzled and frantic and the next person, I do have a few things that I do daily and weekly that help keep us all on track around here. So today, with it being Sunday, I thought I’d share some things I do on Sundays that help our family have a better week ahead.
At the stage of life I am in (my daughters are 4 and 6), our weekends are pretty full. It’s rare that we don’t have sporting event or activity, birthday party or something else that fills up the first part of our weekend. That leaves us Sunday
as the only time for relaxation and downtime during the week. We try to make to make family time a priority on Sunday as well as time to regroup and reset for the week ahead.
Like most of the other days of the week, I start my Sundays off with a cup of coffee and my planner. My hubby comes home at 5 in the morning on Sunday so I usually am up when he gets home. As he goes to bed, I go downstairs to bask in the quiet time before the chaos of the day. I am using my Erin Condren Life Planner (which I had to replace, you can read about that here). I like to plan my week on Sunday mornings and make a list of the things I want to accomplish for the day. When I am done planning, I get started on some cleaning tasks. Depending on how busy Saturday is, this may include some laundry and mopping the kitchen. Usually I can get the majority of my deep cleaning done on Saturday nights. I try to do some work on my blog – and engage with people on social media for a little bit. My girls are usually awake by 730/8 so I make them breakfast and sneak in a few snuggles while they watch some cartoons.
While they are occupied, I pick out clothes for Monday. Laundry is pretty much done, so I make sure that my outfit for work is ready as well as Mackenzie’s school uniform is ironed and ready to go for the morning. I like my mornings to be calm and not rushed and this really helps with that. It saves time in the morning and you feel that much more prepared to kick Monday’s butt.
Once I am done picking out clothes, I have the girls come upstairs to get ready for the day. This is our family day – and we always do something together as a family. My husband is a stickler for wanting to be awoken at 1130am, so we can be out of the house for 12pm (mind you – he may have only gotten 4 hours of sleep if he is lucky), but he insists (he’s amazing). By noon we are out and about doing anything and everything from going to eat, going to the park, food shopping, movies, hiking – especially now with the weather turning nice, we try to get outdoors and enjoy the weather and take our dog Bailey along with us.
We are usually home by 5pm, and then it becomes full blown prep for the week mode. Hubby gathers up all the garbage because it comes in the morning. The girls head upstairs to the bath and I start on dinner. I try hard to have a nice family dinner on Sunday nights. My daughters help clear the table after dinner, I make lunches for myself and Mackenzie, go through my daughter’s backpack in case I missed anything, and get things ready for the morning. I look at my meal plan to pull out the ingredients I need for tomorrow’s dinner. If veggies need to be chopped, I’ll do that now and put it in a Ziploc baggie until the next day.
After that, we will sit down and watch a movie or show as a family. The girls are in bed by 830pm and either my husband or myself will read a story to the girls which is something we’ve done since they were babies and they still ask us to do it. After they are in bed, I will watch something my husband wants (usually sports) and check my Instagram, or browse Pinterest before bed.
Not all weeks are like this, but the days that are make for such a productive week. Do you have any Sunday tricks that help your week ahead? I’d love to hear about them!
