That's probably easier said than done but it's such a necessity when you become a parent. ​As wonderful as having kids can be they come with alot of chaos and a screaming baby can easily throw you off or turn your brain into mush! I'm a A typical personality borderline OCD where I like to have all my ducks in a row. Cleaning was a big part of my routine before I had my son and after he was born I found so difficult keeping my house clean...I still do!

Believe it or not, when my house is not clean it gives me extreme stress and anxiety. My home is my sanctuary after a long day at work and when I come home and look around and everything is strewn about my mood immediately shifts.

Even after my son went to bed I would try cleaning but I found I was only be able to get through one room and then the next night I would repeat the same room! It was an endless cycle of one room, usually the kitchen, being cleaned and everything else still a war zone. While searching the internet I find a thing called "zone cleaning". Now this is not a foreign concept and frankly I was annoyed that it didn't come to me on my own but I have mommy brain where it doesn't quite function like it use to!

Zone Cleaning tells you that you should spend 15 minutes a day on a different room to clean. By doing this, you're forcing yourself to straighten up without spending hours and becoming exhausted. After my son went to bed, I started spending 15 minutes in each room and amazingly my house didn't look like a tornado ran through it. I also started saving most of my laundry for Sunday so I get to spend most of my time where it matters, playing with my family. 

Sometimes it gets out of hand because that thing called life gets in the way and I can sort of feel that anxiety creeping back up but I try and tell myself to relax, it only takes 15 minutes to get back to normal. I'm also trying to learn that a messy house doesn't necessarily mean a dirty house. If laundry has been sitting on the desk for a couple of days, that's ok. You find that things will have a place and everything will be in it's place...eventually!

Additionally, my new "organized life" consists of trying to get things ready the night before so I'm not scrambling in the morning to get things together and out the door. My husband and I have a good routine in the morning to get our son ready for daycare. While I'm giving him breakfast, my husband is getting the bottles ready for daycare, while I'm getting dressed my husband is getting our son dressed or hanging out with him. If you're lucky enough to have a great partner, assign yourselves you're duties and it brings down the stress. In the beginning I felt like I needed to do it all myself, I'm mom I can do it all! But it's not true, you need help and if you don't have another person to help you than you need to be you're own helper and getting yourself better organized will do that. Prepare bottles the night before, pick out clothes, pack bags and have them sitting by the door for the next morning. The less you have to do as soon as the day starts the better your day will flow.

Give it a try - what can it hurt right?

XO,

Lisa