This is part 2 in a series on self-discipline and systems in homemaking. In part one, “Systems in Homemaking – What I Learned from a Video Game,” we talked about the differences between self-control and self-discipline, and why that matters in our daily lives.
Something hit me as I approached my 40s. I’d been the menu planner, grocery shopper, and dinner-maker for 20 years, and if I live to be 80, I’ve still got 40 more years of deciding what’s for dinner.
Every. Single. Day.
Okay maybe not every single day. Sometimes we eat out.
First world problems? Absolutely. But still a big part of the daily mental load for a wife and mother.
I’ve struggled mightily at times with my attitude about food preparation, and I’ve come to the earth-shattering realization – hold onto your hats – that if I begin to resent my family for needing to eat multiple times a day, every day, it’s probably a me problem.
Ahem.
I’ve also realized something else: I rarely resent laundry. Even though the hamper is never empty; even though it’s been mainly my job for 20 years and will be for the next 40. So why don’t I mind it so much?
Partially because it doesn’t involve as much decision-making, but mostly because I have a system for it.
Systems are basically habits, ways of handling our homemaking tasks so they’re on autopilot and don’t contribute to decision fatigue.
Now I’m working on developing a better system for dinner prep so the question, “What’s for dinner?” doesn’t cause me stress and frustration. Do you need better systems in your home, too? Like anything else, it takes time, trial and error. If you’re struggling in any of these areas like me, here are a few ideas to get us either started, or back on track.
Some of these are very basic, to the point where I hesitated to even include them. But as I went through and reread it, I was surprised at a few tidbits here and there that I knew, but I’d forgotten and stopped practicing. So even if you know these things too, it still might be a good reminder to get back up and try again on some of them. So here goes…
Menu planning
Having themed days can be super helpful. Taco Tuesdays, Sheet pan meals every Thursday, Roasts every Sunday. Within each of these you can still offer variety (taco soup, taco casserole, enchiladas), but at least it can help narrow down the search.
Two other things have been helping me immensely lately: 1) having a master list of meals my family likes, which names every recipe no matter where it comes from; and 2) a binder for any recipes printed from web sites – only including the ones we know we like.
Ask your family to brainstorm with you all the meals they’ve enjoyed. You could also have a list on the fridge for a while to add to as ideas come to mind. But this list is only for the recipes you know you like, not ideas for new ones.
When you have a decent list of tried-and-true recipes, it gives a source to go to when deciding this week’s menu.
Now you can take that list and head to the pantry and freezer. What recipes do you already have a few ingredients in the pantry for? This will help you decide on meals, and then you can make your grocery list based on the remaining items needed.
Food Prep
I’ve been developing a food prep system lately that’s becoming an absolute blessing. I do my best to never schedule any errands on Mondays so from about 9:00 until noon, I have a big food prep morning. I clear out the fridge and wipe it down, assess what needs to be used up, then prep Monday night’s dinner.
With whatever time is left, I take from my grocery order over the weekend and prep for the week ahead – anything I can chop, wash, or thaw. This gives a huge boost to the rest of my week, making meal prep so much simpler.
The rest of the week, as part of my morning routine I try to do something to prep for dinner that night, even if it’s small. This is slowly transforming me from a frustrated, searching-the-fridge-at-4:30-for-dinner-ideas mom to having dinner somewhat prepped by 10:00 a.m., and it has brought so much peace to my days.
How about you? You may not be able to devote Monday mornings, but I bet you have chunks of time in your week that could help take the pressure off your meal prepping.
Seasonal Prep:
I’ve also done seasonal prep of ingredients, particularly with soups. In the cooler months we have soup at least 1-2 times per week. To prepare for this, over the course of a few weeks in the fall I buy up to 5 bags each of onions, carrots, and celery and I chop them up, some with the help of the food processor. Then I freeze them flat on a parchment-lined sheet pan and bag them up. This makes my winter food prep incredibly simple. When we’re having soup, I chop the potatoes, then instead of also chopping onions, carrots, and celery, I pull my prepped bags of these ingredients from the freezer, plop in a few handfuls of each, and soup’s on!
It also helps that we get a ¼ cow, including soup bones, so the frozen broth and stew meat that comes off the bones can also be plopped into the crockpot in the morning. But even without that, having all those veggies prepped is a game-changer.
Share the load
In our home, we’ve entered a new phase in life. When Silas was 14 we had him take over washing dishes and loading the dishwasher, and Haley drying and putting them away.
Before this, I did all the washing and loading and they took turns putting away, but I switched it up when my workload increased in other areas. They get to learn an important life skill – you’re welcome, future spouses – and I’m able to shift my energy to these other tasks and know my kitchen won’t completely fall apart. What a blessing when teaching our kids life skills also eases our burden!
If your kids are younger, this will look a little different: teaching smaller children to do chores does indeed make the chores take longer at first. But I promise you, the invested time will be worth it. Once you’ve got good habits and skills established in your children, your home can run FAR more smoothly than if you try to do everything yourself because “it’s quicker.”
You can start younger kids on unloading the dishwasher, helping fold or put away laundry, wiping down the table after dinner. Chore chart systems are also a lifesaver. Charts force us to make the decisions once about what jobs need to be done on what days, so when it’s chore time we can just point them to the chart.
Batching
Remember Ma Ingalls in Little House on the Prairie? Her schedule was: wash on Monday, iron on Tuesday, mend on Wednesday, churn on Thursday, clean on Friday, bake on Saturday, rest on Sunday. I know she’s a fictional character, but go with me on this – I’m positive she did about a hundred more things on each of those days, including making three meals from scratch. There was a rhythm to the days, though, where the big projects that needed doing had their time slot.
What kinds of tasks that you do often could instead be done once a week? Certainly not everything would work well that way, but maybe like my Monday meal prep, having a few days set aside for laundry (I personally don’t recommend one big washing day, but it may work in some situations), or baking all your bread on one day, some things can be done once to help take the pressure off the rest of your week.
Treat it like a Business
The ultimate goal in our home is to help it feel like a home, not a business. Yet, when we employ some of the same mindsets that businesses use, it can help us immensely.
A good business runs efficiently and smoothly so it can deliver products or services in a timely manner. It does this through systems, routines, rhythms that decrease decision fatigue and avoid chaos.
One practical example I’ve seen on Youtube is having a “closing shift” mindset about the kitchen. Like a restaurant kitchen, they will put things away, wipe down counters, have the dishwasher running; all these things to reset it for use the next day.
In manufacturing, there’s also something called LEAN. The principle that sticks out most is how they “create flow.” I think they borrowed this from our grandmothers who said, “A place for everything, and everything in its place.” Essentially, they’ll go so far as to put down tape on their work spaces labeled Screwdriver, Pliers, etc. They make sure they put it in the best possible spot so when they’re working they can grab it, use it, and put it back without scrambling, and know that next time they need it, it’s where it belongs.
Good business systems also allow for training others in the same responsibilities while maintaining similar outcomes. A.k.a., sharing the load with other family members. All of this essentially sums up what our homes can be like – they can run quite smoothly through systems and rhythms that bring order so that when our husbands and children and friends come into our home, it’s a reprieve from the chaos of the world, not an extension of it.
God is, after all, a God of order, of rhythms and seasons and structure. When little by little we bring our lives into order and create rhythms in our homes, it brings peace because our actions line up with who we are: people made in His image.
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