I know I’ve posted about it before, but I have trouble getting everything done – cleaning, reading, cooking, spending time with hubby, taking care of the cats, etc. Our life has no formal schedule right now as hubby isn’t working except for the occasional contract job. Last week was kind of crazy since he was out of town for a couple days and worked a contract job Wednesday through Friday. This is the first week in months that I’ve been home by myself during the day.

I love my hubby very very much. When he’s home, I tend to just do things with him, whatever activity we decide we want to pursue. As a result, most of my housekeeping falls by the wayside. I’m not saying there’s anything wrong with spending so much time with my husband. I just think that I’m letting him down in a way because our house isn’t clean, I’m not organized, and I’m really bad about making a nice supper. When hubby was working, right after I got laid off, I was making nice dinners. I was happy to be the wife who would greet her hubby with a hot dinner after he arrived home from a long day of work. Because we’re home all the time (excepting those days when hubby finds contract work), all our meals are kind of thrown together at the last minute.

We live in Arizona. It’s May. It’s hot. We’re broke. We’re also challenging ourselves to at least hold out until June before turning on the air conditioning and driving up the electric bill. Towards the end of last week, I discovered a very loose schedule that works wonders with this weather. If I plan my day so that the housework is done in the morning, it requires less sweat and effort. Then I can spend the afternoon job searching, writing, organizing, etc. All of these are things that require little movement.

Simple, right? I really wonder why I didn’t think of it before. This schedule also tied in well with my attempts at creating new habits this week. My morning cleaning schedule involves dishes, vacuuming, making the bed, sweeping, and cleaning out the litter boxes. As I’m trying to complete all the housework in the mornings, I challenge myself to finish by 11 and end up creating a smooth flow as I move from room to room.

The only thing I’m falling behind on is my personal Bible reading. Hubby and I read together every night so I am reading the Bible daily. However, I’m only reading it on my own about half the week. I’ll keep working on this.

My challenge this week is to fine tune my morning schedule and decide what tasks need completed daily versus weekly. I also need to spend more time in the afternoon looking for work.