Waking Up Early: Day 20 - Plans Trump Time

I'm a few days behind on writing.  The whole pastor resigning thing has really rocked our world, and made us very exhausted at the end of the day (when I usually fit in blogging), and so I could not put coherent words together.  HOWEVER - I AM still working on this "Waking Up Early" challenge I have given myself.  So here's how Monday went:

Jonah got up at 6:54.  I gave him my phone on airplane mode and he stayed quiet playing "Endless Reader" until 7:30.  I'm sorry people who insist your kids shouldn't play on your phones.  I get apps that I feel are educational and sometimes we go with it.  You do what you gotta do to keep the kid from setting the house on fire/breaking bones.  Then the baby was up and we went downstairs so John could get a little more sleep.  I decided that I MUST clean the kitchen before I did anything else.  SO I DID!  Then I made banana/egg pancakes:

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I felt like singing that "This girl is on Fi-Yah!" song, but those are the only words I know.  Instead, I ate those pancakes up!  I add a tablespoon of gluten-free pancake mix, and a tablespoon of milk, and a big sprinkle of cinnamon and they're not so chewy. We also put maple syrup on top.

All this before 9 am on a Monday. It hit me.  It doesn't matter what time I wake up.  What matters is that I have a PLAN for when I wake up.  Today's plan was: Clean the kitchen immediately. Use the bananas before they go bad.  I realized, I am so much more task oriented than time oriented.  This is why I am late to places because I give myself more tasks than I have time.  This is why I feel inadequate at the end of the day, because I have so many tasks I haven't completed and I feel like I didn't have enough time to do them, even if I tried.  I'm 29.  How did I miss this about myself?  Whew.

So, I am not setting my alarm clock.  Instead, I am setting my task list for the three biggest portions of my day.  Every day it looks something like this:

Morning/Before Kids' Nap:
1. Clean the Kitchen
2. Get Outside (this would be walking/running/park or even just front porch playtime)
3. Either fold or wash ONE load of laundry

During Naptime:
1. Quiet Time to meet with Jesus, pray, Bible
2. Blog or E-mail
3. Call/message someone to encourage

Afternoon/Before Kids' Bedtime:
1. Pick Up Upstairs Clutter
2. Pick Up Downstairs Clutter
3. Clean one thing (Vacuum/Bathrooms/etc)

I feel like this will allow me enough wiggle-room to still go places and do things, and not put myself on a time limit as much as a task goal.  I'm excited about this!

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