Simplify family life with a family schedule
If you’re constantly running around, forgetting important appointments, or trying and failing to fit multiple commitments into each day, then a family schedule is the game changer you never knew you needed.
If a family schedule is something you’d like to learn more about, this article will explain what a family schedule is, the benefits of family scheduling, and the steps you can take to create your very own schedule, that will not only simplify family life, but also help you to become a more organised mum.
Let’s dive into how a schedule can help maintain order in your daily family life.
Bookmark this post for future reference on Pinterest. Thank you!
This post contains affiliate links. If you make a purchase using these links, I may receive a small commission at no extra cost to you. Find out more here.
What is a family schedule?
A family schedule is one of the best ways to organise your family, it allows you to allocate time to important family activities, so everything that needs to get done, gets done.
The benefits of family scheduling
Here are four reasons why family scheduling is beneficial:
- Allows you to allocate time for things that matter
- Helps you to be more productive
- Helps you to remember important events and appointments
- Teaches your children to be responsible for their own activities
How to start a family schedule
Your family schedule should be one that works for your family, which means it can be as loose, or as firm as you need it to be.
Here are the steps to create your own family schedule.
Decide on a scheduling tool
You’ll need to decide where you’ll write your family schedule, which means deciding between paper based or digital planners.
Some paper based planners that you can use include a planner notepad, daily planner, or a family calendar.
Digital planners include Google Calendar, or a variety of daily planning apps.
You may even like to combine paper and digital planning tools, which is something I do for my family schedule, where I write my family’s daily activities in a paper planner, then use Google Calendar to allocate times to them.
Make a list of daily activities
The next step in creating a schedule for your family is to list all the commitments, and daily activities for each family member.
Your list will include non-negotiable activities, activities that must be done such as sports, meetings, and appointments, and negotiable activities, activities that can be moved around like meals, or family outings.
When writing your list, write down everything that comes to mind, editing the list comes later.
Some examples of daily activities include:
- Bedtime routines
- Cleaning routines
- Exercise
- Family goal setting activities
- Family outings
- Family routines
- Family time
- Getting ready for school
- Grocery shopping
- Homework
- Household chores
- Kid’s extra-curricular activities
- Packing and unpacking school bags
- Planning and cooking meals
- School drop off and pick up
- Self-care
- Sleep
- Work commitments
Write your family schedule
Once you know what scheduling tool you’re going to use, and you have a list of all your daily activities, it’s time to start writing your family schedule.
The first step here is to look at your daily activities list and identify your most important tasks or family routines (your non-negotiable activities) that have to get scheduled.
Once identified, enter these activities into your family schedule against the time you want to do them.
Remember to add a little more time to the end of each task, because tasks can take longer than you think to finish, and some tasks that require driving need some traffic time added to them.
Once you have your non-negotiable activities scheduled, work through your daily activities list and add the negotiable tasks you have time for.
If a task can be delegated to another family member, delegate it to them.
Adjust your family schedule
Once you’ve developed a family schedule, review your daily activities list regularly to ensure that your schedule includes the tasks it needs to.
For example, after reviewing your daily activities list, you may see an activity that’s suddenly become a non-negotiable, so you need to find time for it in your family schedule.
Or the opposite may happen, and you see a daily activity that’s changed from a non-negotiable to a negotiable, so you can remove it from your schedule.
Regularly reviewing your daily activities list, and altering your family schedule to accommodate any changes, is a great way to ensure that you continue to work on things that are important to your family.
Creating a family schedule – a recap
Creating a family schedule is one of the best ways to bring more organisation and structure to family life.
With a clear schedule in place, you can ensure that everything that needs to be done each day actually gets done.
Family scheduling helps you remember important events and appointments, teaches your children responsibility, enables you to make time for what mattes, and helps you become more productive.
Creating your own family schedule is easy, start by choosing a paper based or digital scheduling tool, then write a list of your family’s daily activities, adding the most important activities to your schedule.
Regularly reviewing and adjusting the activities that are on your schedule means that you’ll always be working on what’s important to your family.
What’s the biggest challenge you face when trying to keep your family’s schedule organised?
Like this post? Share it with others on Pinterest – Thank you!
