Making Your Home a Haven Monday
It's Monday again - time to focus on cleaning, organizing, simplifying, and beautifying our lives and homes so that we may be a testimony and blessing to our family and to all those who would enter our doors.1) Refresh Your Spirit
Begin today with the Lord. Brew yourself something delicious to drink and sit down for a few moments of quiet before the Lord. Pray, read and meditate on Scripture, ask the Lord for His blessing upon your day, and commit this day to Him.
Related: Monica is doing an excellent series on having a clean heart. If you have a moment, be sure to check out her excellent Scripture-based series here. Also, Amy is giving away copies of her devotional ebook Clean Heart, Clean Home here.
2) Tackle your Morning Routine
Once you've committed your day to the Lord and spent some time communing with Him, attack your morning routine with a smile. If you don't have a morning routine, details on creating a simple routine are here. Our morning routine is here.
Related: Amy has a printable daily routine sheet here.
*Project: Share your morning routine on your blog (once you've finished it, of course!).
3) Take Time to Plan (5 minutes)
Once your simple morning routine is finished, if you've not sat down to make a short to-do list for today, take time to do that now. A few minutes of strategic planning before you begin your day can not only help you to be much more productive, but it can also save you a lot of time.
If you are married, I encourage you to ask your husband if there is anything you can do for him today. If he mentions anything, make that your top priority to accomplish today. Keep your list it to ten items or less. Number the items in order of importance and tackle the first one. Don't move on to #2 on your list until #1 is completely finished.
*Project: Post your list on your blog and cross things off as you finish them! Let's help keep each other accountable. Remember, though, to see your list as a guideline, not a slave master. The list is just meant to help you not be aimless. If other things come up which are more important, be cheerful and flexible.
4) What's For Dinner?
Do you know what you're having for dinner? If so, do as much preparation work for it as you can do by noon. This makes our day go so much better and our late afternoons run much more smoothly.
*Project: Post your dinner menu on your blog so we can all be inspired!
5) Do Something! (10 minutes)
Since we tackled our entryway/coat closet last week, we're moving on to our living rooms today. Light a candle, put on your apron, turn on some uplifting music, and then set the timer for ten minutes and get busy cleaning your living room! Start by putting throwing out trash, putting away misplaced items, and straightening up things. If you have time, do a quick dust and vacuum of the room.
Related: For those of you struggling with a large amount of clutter, you might enjoy checking out Amy's helpful Colossal Clutter Clean-Up.
Project: Post before and after pictures of your living room on your blog.
I'll post what I did for this challenge along with pictures in a separate entry later today.
Graphic from Art.com
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Would you like to join us in this "Making Your Home a Haven" Challenge? Just do one or more of the challenges listed above or something else related to "making your home a haven" and post about it on your blog. Come back here and leave your link below so that we can be inspired!
Labels: Making Your Home a Haven
posted by Crystal Paine at 8:00 AM
6 Comments:
I just wanted to be sure that you knew about the new devotional that's offered free as well. It's a weekly devotion (the CCC uses some of the devotions from there). You can check it out at:
http://www.homeschoolblogger.com/DandelionSeeds/437683/
Bless your heart and home,
Amy
Thanks, Crystal! I haven't blogged in almost a month, and this was just the thing to draw me back in!
Thanks for the challenge, Crystal -- it motivated me to pick up our living room today after babysitting nieces and nephews yesterday and 'letting it go' this morning. :) I'm sure my hubby will appreciate the 'peaceful' atmosphere when he comes home tonight. :)
Debi
Crystal - I am loving this feature on your blog. I can't participate for a few weeks because of coming baby, but am looking forward to joining again as soon as I can! Thank you!
Monica
We have that awful counter space in the kitchen. On Mondays, I like to clean it all off and start the week fresh and clean. When the counter is clean, it seems that the rest of the house falls into place!
I'm glad this has started up again! Thanks Crystal!
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