Home, the spot of earth supremely blest, A dearer, sweeter spot than all the rest.
Robert Montgomery

I’m curious to know what a day’s schedule is like for you. You really have such great priorities and I’m wondering how you fit everything in each day or week? Between taking care of your kids, husband, spending time with the Lord, serving, planning, buying food from different sources, cooking, cleaning…How do you do it? I’m encouraged by your site and tips, and want to start so many things you’ve shared as I’m getting married soon and want to make my home a haven without getting overwhelmed with all the details. Any tips on some of the best ways you organize your time?

Dear friend, let me first say, I commend you for making an effort to develop good organization habits prior to getting married! Secondly, may I just say that there are different seasons in life. There are times when the schedule goes out the window (like when we welcomed #2!), and other times when God draws us back into a period of rest and reviewing our lives to eliminate anything that might be causing stress or mixing up our priorities. It is important to seek to make your home a haven, but it must not be pursued before maintaining peaceful relationships in your home. Keep are some thoughts the Lord has graciously taught me…

1. Keep your relationship with the Lord first and rise early.

We strive to wake up each day by 6:30 am so we can have some refreshing times in the Word both independently and together. We get far more accomplished in our day when we start early enough. Lately this has definitely been rough to maintain with a little guy that is keeping us up late into the night, but it is our goal. I personally cannot pursue a wise management of my home apart from my relationship with the Lord. I need to cry out to Him daily for the ability to faithfully complete the task He has called for me. Even if I can just take a few moments to pray, pick a verse to meditate upon throughout the day, I am strengthened to complete my homemaking responsibilities with a joyful countenance. May the Joy of the Lord be your strength! (Nehemiah 8:9-12).

Eliminate physical clutter. More importantly, eliminate spiritual clutter. ~D.H. Mondfleur

2. Keep your priorities in the right place. Maintain regular date nights & family nights.

I have really been enjoying implementing a focused time with my little ones. Each day, Karis and I sit down for an hour to do various learning activities together. This helps keeps my priorities in the right place. Relationships are first! When I keep this in balance, by Gods grace, everything else falls into place.

3. Take time to rest.

Acknowledge Sunday as the Lord’s appointed day of rest. Take time to be a family and enjoy each other’s company! If you can take regular prayer retreats to just get away for a few hours, or a whole day, it does wonders for maintaining a God-centered perspective in your calling.

4. Maintain a right perspective of the home.

What is the purpose of your home? My purpose is to maintain a peaceful restful home. I want it to be a haven for my family and those I welcome in hospitality. This provides me good Biblical motivation to keep it maintained in an orderly fashion. Simplifying allows for more time to focus on relationships with your family and others.

A good home must be made, not bought.
Joyce Maynard

5. Have an annual/bi-annual re-haul of your home.

This is my number one means of keeping a simple home. I am continually seeking to de-clutter. When my home is organized and simple, there is peace. My goal is to have a place for everything and everything in its place as much as possible. More stuff means more things to maintain, clean, organize, break and replace! At the beginning of every year, I progressively work through each room in our home and thoroughly de-clutter. I mean thoroughly! Be aggressive! Don’t hold on to anything you don’t need. If it hasn’t been used in a few months, it is removed. I then take a load to charity (i.e. Pregnancy Resource Center, charity clothing store) or sell items on craigslist. Once you do this, each following year becomes easier! I complete an extensive cleaning spree just prior to Summer and also clear out any excess. These items then get stored for a summer garage sale.

6. Complete a daily to-do list (but keep it flexible!).

Every night before I retire, I try to compile a brief list of tasks for the next day. This helps me plan in advance and get a good start on the next day. Writing it down helps me sleep better! My list is never more than five items in length. Keep it manageable, especially if you have children around.

7. Hold a weekly family planning meeting.

This was a habit developed when I was growing up. Every Sunday evening, our family would gather in the living room to discuss our schedules for the weeks, transportation needs, etc. Now, Aaron and I take a few moments each Sunday evening and sync our schedules for the week. Helps keep us organized and communicating well.

8. Develop Morning & Evening routines.

Having a simple list of morning responsibilities helps give me a kick start for the day. My list includes: Prepare breakfast, think ahead and make dinner preparations, fill up water bottle, clean kitchen, etc. After dinner I complete the following tasks: clean up kitchen, quick house pick up, make quick meal preparations for the next day (pull out anything from the freezer, soak something, etc), and finally make a to-do list for the next day.

9. Make a regular schedule for cleaning/house maintenance.

How can you peacefully maintain housecleaning? Map out a simple schedule for your home maintenance. One load of laundry a day, bathrooms on Tuesday, Kitchen on Wednesday, or whatever method suits you. Write it out and place it in a visible spot that you view most frequently. I prefer keeping housecleaning to once a week myself, but then again I have a small two bedroom condo to maintain so it is fairly easy to do so. This is basic housecleaning though. I rarely get to indepth cleaning at this season of my life. Things are picked up, bathrooms cleaned, dust, and vacuumed throughout the house. We leave those deep cleaning projects for our annual spring cleaning spree.

10. Work quickly.

It seems basic but it is important to set your mind to a task and stick to it! Whatever you hand finds to do, do it with all your might! (Eccl. 9:10)

11. Conquer your distraction.

We all have them. Too much of anything can be a bad thing. Too much computer, phone, email or even reading. My weakness is too much computer time and God graciously is working on me by removing my computer all together. Ephesians 5:16 says, “Make the most of your time for the days are evil.”

12. Make a simple schedule for your days activities.

For our family, having a simple schedule is very beneficial but not completely necessary. Rather than mapping out hour by hour how our day will transpire, I work around a model of “themes” or focuses for each day of the week. This gives me more freedom to not get overly consumed with my to-do list as it is much more simplified.

For example:

Mondays: Organizing for the week, Finish laundry (if necessary)
Wednesdays: Housecleaning (one week I clean the upstairs, the following week I clean the downstairs)
Thursdays: Baking Day (Karis and I like to make one or two recipes of muffins, coffeecake, etc. for the upcoming week – this is our morning activity together)
Fridays: Errands (I have simplified our lives a lot by doing a monthly shopping run based upon our monthly menu plan and a weekly errand run)
Saturdays: Laundry day

That being said, a day in our life looks something like this:

6:30 am – Rise, personal devotions, exercise (Tues & Thurs), family devotions
8:30 am- Breakfast and morning routine
10-11 am – Karis learning time – our focused time together
11:30 am – Prepare lunch
1:00 pm – Children down for afternoon nap while mommy rests, reads, blogs or does errands
4:30 pm – Dinner prep
5:30 pm – Dinner and evening routine
8:00 pm – Kids to bed and hubby time

That’s about it! I love the simple life…

For further inspiration for simplifying in many aspects of your home, check out my Simple Living Series. Join me in the nitty gritty aspects of simplifying my home.

Simplifying in the Bedroom
Simplifying Menu Planning
Simplifying in the Bathroom
Simplifying in the Kitchen
Simplifying Your Wardrobe
Simplifying Your Purchases
Simplifying the Toy Collection
Simplifying Your Home Office

Further Resources:

Managers of Their Home by Steve & Teri Maxwell – this is a helpful resource especially for home school mothers for managing your homes. My mom used this constantly growing up in order to manage all the different schedules of a household with eight children.
Shopping for Time: How to Do it All and Not Be Overwhelmed by Carolyn Mahaney – my favorite read on maintaining a proper balance of being wise users of time, keeping Christ first, and still maintaining your home. Read my review here.
Confessions of an Organized Homemaker – a great practical book on home organization.

What tips can you have to share?

I have been using a Nutrimill for several years now and love this machine!

PRO’s: It has a very trim design and is not huge and awkward making it easy to store on my kitchen counter tucked in the corner for easy access. It produces fresh flour very quickly providing me with a nice batch of flour in a matter of minutes. It actually stays relatively clean while grinding flour and does not have a huge off spray, thus providing easy clean up. Its works very well for grinding fresh flours for all your baking needs. It has a twenty cup bowl capacity, so you can prepare a lot of flour at once or any smaller amounts as well. The Nutrimill keeps your flour at temperatures (typically around 118 degrees) that protect the nutrients in your grains. Its new airflow design makes it the world’s coolest-running impact mill. Customer service is excellent. My machine actually broke in a month’s time and the company paid to have it fixed and shipped back to me. It hasn’t had a problem since. It has a lifetime warranty including the stainless steel blades.

CON’s: It has various settings to adjust the fineness of the grind, but I have not found them to be very effective. It produces a fine grind rather than a course grind. The only things I found it difficult to grind included whole corn, and oatmeal. In these cases, I recommend grinding it together with another smooth grain such as wheat/spelt/kamut/brown rice grain. Mixing them together made it grind perfectly. I wouldn’t say this machine is quiet, but it is definitely not as loud as my mother’s old fashioned grinder. It is not cheap, but is definitely a worthwhile investment for all the nutrition value of grinding your own grain!

To read more of the benefits of grinding your own grain, check out these posts:

Is buying whole grains cheaper?
The Value of Soaking Your Grains

Quinoa

According to Sally Fallon in Nourishing Traditions, “Quinoa contains 16-20 perfect protein and is high in cystine, lysine and methionine – amino acids that tend to be low in other grains. It contains iron, calcium and phosphorus, B vitamins and vitamin E, and is relatively high in fat. Like all grains, quinoa contains antinutrients and therefore requires a long soaking as part of the preparation process.” (To learn more about the benefits of soaking, visit here.)

Also, a substance on the surface of quinoa called saponins has a bitter taste and must be rinsed away. Rinse thoroughly for one minute in a strainer, soak overnight in water, drain and rinse again for another minute before use.

Creamy Quinoa is our favorite means of eating quinoa. It is a hearty breakfast porridge to boost your energy for the day!

1 cup quinoa
1 1/3 cup water (for cooking)
Additional water (for soaking)
1 Tbsp of an acid medium (for soaking) -kefir, whey, yogurt, lemon juice, etc.

Thoroughly rinse quinoa in a strainer and then cover entirely with water inside a bowl. Mix in your acid medium. Soak overnight. I usually place the strainer of rinsed quinoa into a larger bowl filled with enough water to cover (as pictured). This allows me to easily rinse the grain again in the morning.

Here is my method of soaking quinoa.

In the morning, drain and rinse thoroughly again. Blend 1/3 cup of the quinoa with 1/3 cup water in a blender for 1 minute, until smooth. Remove from blender and combine with remaining quinoa with the remaining 1 cup of water. (If you prefer a completely creamy texture, as we do, blend all the quinoa and water together. Leaving some grains in their whole form will give you more of a crunchy texture.) Add toppings as desired. We love raisins and chopped apples to ours. Bring to a boil and turn on low and simmer for 20 minutes. Top with a little honey and milk and enjoy!

Another favorite combo is blueberries and peanut butter added to the quinoa after it has completed cooking.

Here are a few other ideas for using quinoa:

Quinoa & Black Beans - a hearty side dish!

Quinoa is a wonderful grain to use in making whole grain waffles/pancakes or crepes. I love using it in combination with oats or rice.

For any casserole or dish, quinoa is an easy substitute for rice or a lovely addition to increase this nutritious grain in your diet.

What are your favorite ways to use quinoa?

Food Preservation Classes – Vancouver, WA
I wanted to let all my local readers know that my aunt, Molly, is teaching another set of food preservation classes this month (July 16 & 23 and then again on August 1) and thoroughly covering the topics of canning, freezing and drying of fruits and vegetables. You will be supplied with a hands on demonstration, and a great packet of information to take home with you. It is an excellent class if you are interested in saving money and preserving local foods for the year. For more information, check out her website here.

Natural Living Articles for your enjoyment:

How to Make Soda Pop from Kefir Grains – I love this! What a great alternative to the sugar filled drinks available on the market and for a refreshing summer drink.
Study Finds Cheeseburgers More Nutritious than Baby Food - another reason to make your own homemade baby food! Not only is it far more nutritious, it is also far more frugal and you know exactly what is going in it.
How Much Sugar Are You Really Consuming?- Stephanie shares an very insightful website that gives visual comparison of some popular food items with how many sugar cubes they contain.
Raw Berry Freezer Jam - Kimi shares how to make freezer jam sweetened with honey. I found that using rapadura/sucanat is my personal favorite for sweetening jam (as honey tends to be a little powerful), but we love Pamona’s for a natural pectin. I am looking forward to making blackberry jam later on this year with the free blackberries that grow around our house.

Food, Inc – the Movie – There has been a lot of talk lately about this documentary that highlights the current problems with our food industry. How much do you really know about the process of bringing food to your table? It looks fascinating! Kimi talks about it here as well as Kelly shares her thoughts here. Check out the trailer here. Here is a crazy quote that Kelly passed on from the film:

“We’re spending less on food than anyone in history, only about 9% of our income, cheaper than anyone else in the world.  So we’ve got lots of cheap and abundant food, but…it’s making us fat, we have this tremendous problem with obesity and Type II Diabetes, and as it turns out, cheap food has many many hidden costs.”

For the Garden:
Homemade Fertilizer Recipe – Frugal Granola shares a all natural fertilizer for your garden with nettles! I am making a batch of this today for my container garden!
Natural Weed Killer Recipe – Another awesome natural method for the garden.

This picture was taken immediately after making this batch. It actually thickens to a nice fluffy consistency as it cools in the refrigerator!

I have been on the quest to find a nutritious alternative to the store bought versions of mayonnaise that come filled with soybean or canola oil, two genetically modified ingredients that are best to be avoided. Read more about GMO’s here. I have tried a few different homemade varieties and have shared them here in the past, but either they tasted too strongly of olive oil or else they used evaporated milk. Enter…coconut oil!

A combination of olive oil and coconut oil is the perfect balance to providing a high quality and nutritious mayonnaise. (Read more about these healthy oils here.) Can you believe it? Mayonnaise can actually be healthy for you! We love mayo at our house on everything from deviled eggs, sandwiches, hamburgers, etc. This recipe is a good balance of coconut oil and olive oil in flavor. It is quite delicious! The coconut oil adds just a slight sweetness to it and yet not overpowering when balanced with the olive oil. Using all coconut oil resulted in a solid substance that was overly sweet and coconut tasting, but this recipe was prefect for us and stayed nice and fluffy throughout its duration in the fridge.  I love making my own condiments as I know what goes in it without any additives or unnatural preservatives! Plus it is the frugal way to stretch your budget.

1 whole egg (fresh, free range eggs from the farm are preferred)
2 egg yolks
1 Tablespoon Dijon mustard
1 Tablespoon lemon juice
1/4-1/2 teaspoon sea salt
1/4 teaspoon white pepper
1/3 cup extra virgin coconut oil (melted if solid)
2/3 cup extra virgin olive oil

Combine the eggs, mustard, lemon juice, salt and white pepper in your blender or food processor. Then with the blender or food processor running on a low speed, start adding your oils very slowly. Start out with drops and then work up to about a 1/16 inch stream. It takes a good 5 minutes to accomplish this, but the end result is worth it! Continue blending until all the oil is incorporated.

Makes about 1 1/2 cups. Please in your refrigerator to thicken. Store in an airtight container for up to two weeks. You can add 1 Tablespoon of whey to preserve it for about a month and provide those good fermenting nutrients.

Note: If you do not like the flavor of coconut oil, choose an expeller pressed/refined version. This is flavorless and still healthy, although not as beneficial for your body as the cold-pressed, unrefined versions. I love Mountain Rose Herbs coconut oil, and they sell both varieties. Another good alternative is sesame oil, although again not as nutritious as coconut oil.

Recipe is adapted slightly from Tropical Traditions.

P.S. Looks like I am not the only one thinking about and experimenting with homemade mayo lately. Check out Kelly the Kitchen Kop’s healthy recipe here.

Yummy wild salmon or tuna is another delicious and light lunch. Fish is so incredibly beneficial for the heart and should be consumed regularly in your diet. It is important to make sure to select wild fish options. Why? One article shared the following report:

In a study published in the journal Science in 2004, researchers discovered that farm-raised salmon had more dioxins and other chemicals like PCBs—polychlorinated biphenyls, which the Department of Health and Human Services has determined are carcinogens—than in wild salmon. Not just more, but 11 times more! Another study published in a 2005 edition of the journal Nutrition found similar results, theirs showing PCBs were ten times higher in farm-raised salmon than in wild salmon.

1 (14 oz. can) wild salmon (we like the Trader Joe’s version as it is fairly cheap. Beware of small bones, but they are easy to remove prior to adding the rest of the ingredients)
1 1/2 teaspoons paprika
1 1/2 teaspoons garlic powder
3-5 Tablespoons mayonnaise
1/4 teaspoon salt
Whole grain bread or English muffins
Tomato slices
Cheese, shredded

Combine the salmon/tuna, seasonings and mayonnaise until smooth and to your taste. Spread onto your bread and top with a slice of tomato and cheese. Grill till melted in a toaster oven or conventional oven. Enjoy!

Makes about 4 servings.

But…the cost of books surely does add up. How can we pursue the joys of reading and all the benefits it brings without breaking the bank?

First of all, remember that books are valuable! I don’t consider reading just like any other hobby. With each book, we grow in knowledge and understanding. Reading is truly a gift. Books are a good investment of your resources as they can help generations to come. With each purchase, I must always consider, “will this be a wise resource to have for my children or is it a book that could serve a friend if I passed it on?” I definitely do not want to invest in a book that will not strengthen their knowledge and/or spiritual faith. Wise selection of reading materials is very important. As Proverbs says, ‘He who walks with the wise becomes wise, but a companion of fools suffers harm.’ This verse applies just as much to your reading habits! Walk with the wise! If you are spending your time reading fruitless books that do not inspire you onward, than this reading is a waste of time. So be careful how you walk.

Library – I always first check my local library. I have been surprised on many occasions when they carried a book I desired. Inter-library loans is another option. Talk to your librarian about seeing if another library near by might carry it.

Borrow from friends/family - Secondly, if the library does not carry the book, I ask my faithful friends and family, especially if I know they love reading too. Many churches have a church library. Many local Bible colleges/seminaries also have libraries and they are often willing to loan out to the community.

Buy used – If I can’t borrow, I try to find it used. Bargain Books has many sellers that offer books for very cheap. I have often found books for $.99 and then a few dollars for shipping. Powell’s books is another good source.

E-books/Amazon Kindle - Finding books in PDF format is often a cheaper method if you can read on your computer or other hand-held devise. If you have an i-phone or i-pod touch you can download the Amazon Kindle program for free and download a wide variety of books from Amazon for $9.99 each. I love using this for reading while nursing my baby or traveling. It helps me to always keep a book with me and use this time wisely.

What can you do with your books once you have completed them? Instead of buying a new book, reading it once and then putting it on your shelf, consider how you might share it with other people.

Paperback Swap – Another option for you to trade your books with others. This is a better option for children’s and learning books. I have not found a good selection of Christian materials available here.

Cash4Books -an online store that buys your used books. They will even pay for the shipping!

Buy new and then pass it on – This is my favorite way of keeping reading frugal…I share the benefit with others! It is a wonderful opportunity to give and be a blessing. Books are my favorite things to give away as gifts for birthdays, Christmas, graduation, etc., so I strive to keep all my books in good condition so I can pass them on when I am finished.

Donate them to your library - if your books are not in the best shape to swap, sell or giveaway, try donating them to your local library!

Books are such a blessing! Why not be a blessing to others by opening up your library and passing on the blessing!

Do you have any additional tips to share?

1. Reading together – We are currently reading our fifth book together thus far this year! We have grown so much, strengthening each other in our faith, by keeping a book in the house and a book in the car to read together. Reading while we drive here and there has been such a valuable way to make the most of the time. We often like to read a quick chapter before we head to bed at night. We like to read a variety of books together (as you can see on my book list), everything from child-training, marriage, Christian living, to finances. Currently, we are reading “When Sinner’s Say ‘I Do‘” by Dave Harvey. An excellent read! We also are reading through the book of Psalms together in the morning and share insights as we go. Reading with my hubby is my favorite activity!

2. Consistent date nights - at the beginning of the year we purposed to schedule in two date nights a month (on the 2nd & 4th Thursdays of the month). Having this on our schedule is a gentle reminder to get away and spend some quality time together. This is so important! With a nursing baby, we can’t get away very long, but even an hour or two is invaluable to just rest and enjoy each other’s company. If you don’t have family in the area, try organizing a babysitting group with other couples. Take turns watching each others kids. One method I heard of doing this was to have four couples, rotating the children from house to house on a weekly basis. Each couple than has three dates per month and one night watching all the kids.

3. Watching sermons together - another one of our favorite activities is to watch sermons together. We take advantage of Mark Driscoll’s sermon video podcast for a wealth of solid Biblical teaching. I have grown tremendously through this practice! We love watching them and then discussing what we learned. This is a great alternative to do in the evenings after the kids go to bed, as we often don’t get to hear a full sermon on Sundays with little ones in tow (as we purpose to keep our little ones with us during the service).

4. Sync your schedules & budget – we have found syncing our schedules and our budget to be one of the best methods of making sure we don’t overlook anything in our communication and household management. We use various tools such as google calendars (which you can set up to share your calendar with another computer, i-pod touch, iphone or handheld devise), and Cha-Ching (an easy money management program for the Mac which can sync up with other computers, i-pods, or iphones). With each purchase or when scheduling an event, I simply enter it into either of these programs and we are both updated. I am blessed to have an iphone (a refurbished special), which has been extremely beneficial for keeping organized in this way, but it can also just be done from computer to computer.

Those are just a few ideas that we have found beneficial for our marriage. I would love to hear your ideas!