Practical: How I Stay Organized

Since getting married I've made huge progress on organizing life -- I have way more free time now that I ever have and life seems in my control for the most part.

Generally, I like to be organized, but in college I would get so stressed and busy and things would just spiral out of control. Most people who know me wouldn't say I'm exactly a "tidy" person.

However, after getting married, I've felt like I've needed to grow up a little bit and take responsibility for organizing my life!

I wanted to share a few tools/tips that I use to help organize myself :)

1. Household Chores: I use the FlyLady method. It's a little over the top in my opinion so I don't follow everything perfectly, but I love having a plan for every day. Everyday I get an email reminding me of what is on my to-do list as far as home management and it's really not too much work (about 15-20 min/day). As long as I'm actually doing it, the house is almost always guest-ready at the drop of a hat. I love that it helps establish habits too...although it took a while I (almost) always make our bed in the morning and rarely leave the house with dishes in the sink. This is HUGE for me.

2. Grocery Shopping: I try to only go grocery shopping once per month for everything I think we will need and then pick up a few random things I need throughout the month. This means making a huge shopping list, and spending about an hour shopping. But it's totally worth it. It saves me so much time to shop monthly rather than weekly. It's great to not have to worry about what we're going to have for dinner every night and it saves money by keeping us from going out to eat or buying impulsively because I need dinner and I'm hungry.

3. Finances: We manage our budgets using Mint. It tracks your purchases via credit and debit cards and categorizes them into budgets. I have an app on my phone, so when I'm thinking about going to the mall or thrifting, I can just check up on my clothing budget...and if there's no money left...I don't go! It's that easy. It's also helpful for tracking savings for big purchases, etc.

With these simple things finally under control, I feel so much more freedom to invest myself into other activities like working out regularly and doing weekly Bible studies. I also feel so much better about inviting others into our home.

If you're not organized right now, don't worry...it's taken me a while to get where I am and I'm still a work in progress. I was so overwhelmed when we first got married with all my responsibilities but now it's kind of natural!