Category Archives: Simplicity

Laundry

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Simplify! Simplify! Simplify!

Conscious Laundry 101: What can we do to reduce work, save time, energy, and money? Here are some more laundry tips for Simplicity Living, “4-Hour” style.

Recent changes in my house:

  • Rule: Each person has only 2 towels with a unique color. Noone may use any towel that is not his own. (This should cut down on the kids taking a new clean towel whenever they feel like it.)
  • Instead of hit-or-miss and inconvenience of trying to get my 5 and 7 year olds to put clothes in the hamper twice per day, I decided I would give them the rule: All dirty clothes off bedroom floor into hamper at night before bed. I still have to tell them to do it, but now I have crossed it off the A.M. list of things to do.
My usual laundry process:
  • I enjoy having our washer/dryer in our main bathroom. (We rent, so this may change this year.) This has allowed me to process laundry in the morning and evening or whenever I am doing other work nearby. This also allows me to re-use water from the tub after the kids take a bath (we don’t use a lot of soap)–I haul bucketfuls to the washer a few feet away, only for the wash cycle (not the rinse cycle). This only takes a couple of extra minutes, saving me money and water consumption. I like the value it helps me demonstrate to my young ones about (water) conservation.

#1: Think of "batch processing": sort many loads of clean laundry all at the same time. #2: Break complex tasks into small steps--this helps you see what can be batched and helps young children learn the small steps instead of being overwhelmed by a multi-step task.

  • Batch Processing. I wash as much through the week as possible, saving the folding and putting away until the weekend. This might be too messy for some people. I have a basket in each child’s room, so during the week, some clean clothes accumulate in their baskets, unfolded. I have a few baskets of clean laundry hanging around in my bedroom (all of these rooms currently on the same floor). I try to get the whole family involved in sorting and putting away laundry on Saturday or Sunday morning. The kids have learned if they are looking for a clean item that’s not in their rooms, check the extra baskets and the dryer. I am thankful when my husband puts away his own laundry, demonstrating to the kids that we all help. Sometimes I do sort a basket or put away towels during the week, but that’s usually because a batch of towels is piling up. Exceptions exist, but it’s the mindset to “Batch it!” that works here. And, you cannot use this as your excuse to procrastinate!
  • I have a 3-bin sorting cart and I made 3 color charts to help the kids see which clothes to put in which bins. This allows the concept to sink into their little heads over time: break the large task into simpler steps. Since the rules on which items can be washed together are fuzzy and different for different households, this allows them to learn over time—they sometimes ask questions about sorting.

Batching sometimes requires duplicitous clothing, such as extra t-shirts of the same color, kids pajamas, or socks and underwear. Anytime we have to scramble to wash a particular item, I ask whether I need to acquire an extra of that item.

These are my loads:

  1. One basket of cleaning rags and kitchen towels per week, washed in hot.
  2. In the sorter: reds/pinks/orange/brown
  3. In the sorter: darks, jeans, including dark towels
  4. In the sorter: lights and whites
  5. In the winter I set aside some items that get special attention, such as woolens that can be washed but not dried. With a load full of “special” items, they aren’t lost in a “regular” load.
  6. A hamper in the master bedroom usually contains my husband’s stuff. It’s nearby to the laundry area. I save up white t-shirts in the bottom of this one to be washed in hot, probably a load every 2 weeks.
  • Every time I begin a new load, I am questioning which load is highest priority right now. Sometimes it is the stuff waiting on the top of the washer (code for “wash me now”), or I do an assessment of what’s in the hampers.
Do you have any tips that make laundry easier or simpler? Do tell!

Dumping the Task List

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I met Patty Lennon at a Mindful Mothering conference a few months ago. She handed me her card when we met. Mom Gets a Life. Huh. Interested.

We sat next to each other–she took notes on her laptop and I noticed that she had some sort of system for making purposeful use out of the conference presentations toward her blogging, perhaps her own personal life–it seemed she might be putting items on her calendar or to do list, or something. Not to mention she was tweeting, I think. Anyway, it turns out we had some great conversations and lunch. I only wished we’d been able to connect some more. It felt we had more to talk about. I’ve been waiting for my right moment to look at her website, Mom Gets A Life –>. Today I did and I’m excited that Patty has practical suggestions to bring us some clarity and simplicity. I posted my own comment on Patty’s post, “Dump Your Massive Task List: A 30-Day Challenge!–>!”

I need a record of my comment on her page, so here it is:

Patty:
I am revving into a new cycle and have tons of energy and feel like I’m gaining some clarity. I’m a driven person and willing to throw out old ideas, so this is working well for me. I am reading The 4-Hour Work Week and gleaning ideas from that to apply to my ways of working at home. Yesterday someone who is launching her own career into coaching people into finding their own passions (kind of like you, in a sense), was telling me how she thinks the most useful approach is managing all of this by “mindful scheduling.” Then last night as I was reading “4-Hour” I was receiving this message about “working from priorities” and letting the rest go (elimination). Today I am feeling these are opposites and I am embracing the work-from-priorities advice. The key piece is elimination, which it seems like your post above is leading to. I can’t say I’m going to run out and make my list of 1,000 things, but I can definitely see the power in it (maybe I will later?). Right now, I’m easily casting things to the wind, so I think right now the steam has been generated to propel me. I’ll give a concrete example: I keep volunteering for more on the Parent Association of our school. I want to follow through with things I’ve already volunteered for, but I’m going to find ways of working more efficiently, not harder (right from 4-Hour, of course). I’m responsible for taking notes at the PA meetings and I have the task I’ve been avoiding which is to type them up. So, today I’m going to tackle it, but I’m going to put them into a format which is much more simplified and focused on the PA group action items, but I’m going to leave out the fluff–no use being a reporter on everything everyone said in the meeting. Just action items. And, I’ll present the “notes” and clearly state that this is the level of note taking I’m willing to sustain. If someone wants to do more work on the notes, they may have at it! Yea, Me! (By the way, it was such good fortune to meet you in NY at the MOM Mindful Mothering conference. That was a great day and I’d wished we had more time to connect there.

I’m on facebook. Email me if you can’t find me. I’m friends with Families for Conscious Living and my blog-FB page is “Hearth and Gnome .com”

I think that the magic behind this massive exercise is the consciousness it would bring to what we’re doing. I’m not convinced yet, but in the Brain of Rachel, these things don’t go away easily. What do you think? Is anyone going to be taking on this challenge?

I will say, I am most definitely ready to dump some tasks. I have to go handle the simplification of my job as Parent Association note-taker. If you don’t know where else to start, why not try Patty’s 30-day challenge?

Deals: The public library

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It’s fairly obvious, right? Your local public library is a great deal.

I’m throwing this up on the blog just as a little reminder to you, dear readers (in every sense), to become a power-user of your public library!

How do I get it done?

I utilize the online ordering feature for my library. I request books to be held for me. I get notified via email and then I go pick them up! This saves me time and trouble when I’m going to the library with or without children.

So, how can you remember to do this on a regular basis? Continue reading →

Q: How do you get children to sleep?

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Q: How do you get children to sleep?

I can finally say that I think I know something about this. My son is now 7 and my daughter is now 5. I started having success when we started getting into daily rhythms (which I have to work very hard at because I would love to do everything on my own schedule and different every time… except that now I love it that we are into a routine because it helps everything else work better!)

My kids do so much better now that we stay as close to the routine as I can. Period. I can tell the difference the next day if they went to bed 1 hour later than usual. This manifests as being very cranky when I pick them up from school the next day, as well as not waking up easily. Waking up easily is a good sign they got enough sleep. The window for both of them is 7 pm, turning off the lights BEFORE then is best. (I actually shoot for 6:30 lights off, and if we do it by 7 pm I give myself a pat on the back–or I go take a hot bath!). That means I try to be brushing teeth and then reading a book at 6pm. A good friend of mine once said,

“When the kids come home from school, my shinanigans are done!” –Sarah H.

and taking that advice is when I do my best.

I just try to focus as much as I can on making dinner at 4 pm, bath at 5:30. We of course are all getting distracted from the job a lot. I am doing better just keep plugging away at nudging them gently along. I put in a load of laundry when they are in the bath tub. I tidy as we go along so that I feel I am getting something done.  Ryhthm, Rhythm, Rhythm is the Waldorf mantra and I have found that it works!  The closer I stick to the same routine every night, the easier it gets. They get a spray of lavender mist as the last moment before the lights are out (DD has a light on to go to sleep and a CD of Jim Weiss “Sweet Dreams”). They get a last minute snack of something that needs no preparation like nuts, dried fruit, banana. [See Bedtime Snacks for more ideas.]

I focus on getting them magnesium every day because this is generally calming to the nervous system and most people are deficient. Calcium is the opposite of magnesium to the nerves. I would be okay with milk and honey every night* as part of the routine if you want, but you can use other things for establishing Routine–even coconut milk and honey or a yogurt. I just give them magnesium in juice with dinner and breakfast (and if they don’t drink it, I just serve it again at the next meal).

*If you give something sweet like milk and honey every night, make sure you give it before teeth brushing! If the child is exhausted, skip the teethbrushing and have them swish out the sugar with a few swishes of water. Then whisk them off to bed, like the sleep fairy!

My Mother’s experience with Cal/Mag before bed is that it strongly interferes with her sleep. Her experience was so strong with it that I recommend doing Cal/Mag early in the day. And, ONLY do Magnesium without Calcium after 4 pm.

If you have a child young enough to take naps I would recommend DAILY RHYTHM with a nap at 10:30 or 11 a.m. Our Pre-k and K children in the Waldorf school get a “quiet time” at 1pm. But, I felt that my little ones at home not yet in school needed their nap earlier in the day as to not interfere with the bedtime. So, breakfast, then a walk outside, then snack and then nap. Worry about lunch and dinner after the nap/quiet time.

It will take time. They will likely resist at first if you have not established rhythm yet. It has to be gently and if you lay on the floor/bed and do not respond to them, eventually they may get it; maybe not every time, but it is good for them no matter if they sleep or not.

Tips:

All tasks melt like butter when I am well-slept. Everything is better with sleep.

If someone told me this 5 years ago, I didn’t believe them. But, now I get it. It’s true for me.

Oh, and me going to sleep at 3 a.m. would totally trash the whole system. My body goes cold at 10pm and I notice brain lags the next day if I stay up to 1am. By 3 am I cannot fall asleep or get warm. Me getting enough sleep is the #1 priority of our home (Mark Sisson’s Primal Blueprint puts it as #5, but for parents and children I put it at No. 1.). Everything is better with sleep. All tasks melt like butter when I am well slept.

So, how do you get it done? What is something you have learned or are struggling with about how to nurture your family and create a more peaceful home?

Reality Check on Attachment Parenting

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There is nothing to feel guilty about children co-sleeping for a good long while. My kids were not going to sleep in their own beds until 5 or 6 years old and that was with me tweaking the situation just enough to help them feel safe in their own rooms. My daughter is 5 and I am totally happy that she goes to bed in her room, then usually wakes up and comes into my bed (and I don’t even notice most of the time, but sometimes it’s a good time for me to go to the potty and get her a drink). I fully remember the days, oh how hard it was, to be woke up many times a night with nursing toddlers. At a certain point (they were 2 and 3 yo), I had to do something, and I did. As gently as I could, but firm and kind and gentle to both of us.

“I need space. I know you don’t need space. But, we have to give a little on this to help each other.”

So, I helped them through it as best as I could and I nightweaned first in both cases (continued in the day for awhile). I have long stories, documented in email and in my online mothering group. It’s all there. And eventually they grow out of it. Yea! There is much we can learn from friends at a La Leche League group or Attachment Parenting International Group or a Pathways Connect Group. But, one of the basic concepts I learned in my mothering journey thus far, is that “attachment parenting” (AP) (and I tried with every fiber of my being to do what I thought it was) is actually impossible (to do 100%) because the culture we are living in just does not support it. I lamented for years, my friends will tell you. Finally, I heard some of the messages from my friends at Families for Conscious Living. The best thing is to get gentle with yourself, seek people to nurture you but most of all nurture yourself during this 10% of your lifespan when the children are young. What most people think of as AP cannot happen in a nuclear family. It happened in tribal extended families. Let’s meet with reality here and find out what we can learn. Babies and children are humans and humans are all about connecting with each other–they should be afforded as long a time to sleep with us and be nurtured, as long as we can. And, mothers stop trying to be the only one nurturing the child and let other caring people have a relationship to nurture the child, too. That is part of the tribal model we are built on. Our tribes are imperfect but they can be improved if we work at that. And that is more important than most of the rest.

Can you seek out a church or similar group? Just for the social reasons alone, it is good for you to develop relationships. Think of finding people you can build your own modern tribe–rather a collection of people who can share life with. Maybe a weekly meal shared preparation while the kids play together. I would not worry as much about the “crunchiness” of the other moms; let food worries go, let vaccination debates go by the wayside. Focus on people whose children you enjoy and mothers who understand kind, loving authority–firm gentleness. If you have that, even if you quietly disagree with other issues, it’s going to work better. One of the features of our society is our extreme individualism and independence. But, we were made to be inter-dependent. This means we are able to be independent but that we choose to work together for both our goods. And, that means we have to overlook the myriad ways that people are able and do choose so many of the OPTIONS. There are too many options, in our technologically advanced society. But, there is a renaissance that is underfoot to return to the intelligence of the heart. If we define ourselves by our consumer choices (health consumer choices like vax or even circ or antibiotics, etc.) or food consumer choices or “green” consumer choices, all. of. it. … we will miss the big picture. Love people. Feed people. Find the silence together. Run in the sprinkler together. Sing and drum together. Knit together. PLAY together. Notice the worms, and slugs and flowers together. Work to live, don’t live to work. Create a quality time not just quantity. We have got to ease up on our selves and each other.