Happy New Year

So with Christmas all but packed away the next “event” in the Reindl house was to ring in the New Year. This included resolutions, party celebrations and preparing for the year ahead. One of my big things for 2016 is that I want to get back on top of is my dear blog. With a baby due in just two months, a very demanding and temperamental toddler that will be turning two in April, my big girl to start 2^nd grade and the Reindl man (hopefully) to return to work in Feb after over two months off mending broken bones, this year is going to be a big one and I’m sure to be pushed to my limits.

My new year’s resolution isn’t “A” resolution but many relating to each aspect of my life so here’s my list;

The 2016 reading challenge I've chosen to do i found on the pop sugar website;

Party Celebrations this year have taken a back seat in comparison to previous years due to a decrease in income over the holiday period as well as an increase in parental ‘cant-be-bothered-ness’. We are celebrating once the New Year is upon us as opposed to doing a big new years eve. Our plans for the New Year include doing some goal setting and reflection with my big Lexx, a midnight kiss with my one and only Reindl man and a family bbq and a dip in the pool at Reindl Nanna’s house on New Year’s Day.

Preparation for the year ahead involves packing away Christmas, sending my big Lexx for a week with my family in Kojonup, getting ready for back to school and then awaiting the arrival of the newest Reindl. I think packing away Christmas will be the cause of a lot of man hours, as I coil and box the 30 odd sets of lights and all the decorations that go with them. The arrival of baby Reindl will consume the next largest portion of my time as I move Ivy into her own room and retrieve all of the baby items from storage, but the one item on my 2016 “To Do” list that I’m looking forward to most is back to school. This is not only because I love the fun that the learning and organisation of a new school year brings but also that my house may be left a little more intact than it is currently with Lexx home from school as well as the Reindl man being off from work.

So tell me what does a new year bring for your household?

Family Command Centre and School Nook

Our house had begun to become one of chaos and confusion. With the Reindl man at work 13 hours a day, 6 days a week, Little miss at full time school and a newborn bubba keeping me busy, i didn't have time to tidy the house, let alone keep up with everyone else's schedule! So I finally decided to put to action the ideas I'd pinned to my command centre board on Pinterest!

I started out with little miss' school nook. I brought a storage cube and some medium command hooks from Masters home improvement which cost me about $30 for both. I mounted the storage cube to the outside wall of her built in robe and placed three of the wall hooks on the adjacent wall. As I explained to her, she puts her library bag, take home folder and backpack on top of the cube, her lunchbox goes in the cube and her shoes get tucked underneath it all. Her uniform gets hung up on the other wall, her skort, t-shirt and dress each have their own hook. This is the end result:

The following week i started to gather all the things i was going to need for command central. That included scouring Etsy for appropriate house hold documents (I got mine custom made from Rachael at All About The House), heading to Typo to get a blackboard, decorative mason jar, coloured milk bottle and a decorative letter "R" for Reindl and and also a quick call in to officeworks for some cool pens, document wallets and a pretty folder for my household docs. I also had the shelf, whiteboard/corkboard and the requirements for the receipt box on hand.

Rachael made me up a tailored cleaning schedule, peek at the week, online order tracker, password log, a universal month at a glance calendar, shopping list and an entry sheet for my paid bills, all in the design of my choice. i've displayed the cleaning schedule and peek at the week in some clear document wallets stuck to the wall.

What i have written on my whiteboard is null and void now that i have my peek at the week sheet so that will probably be used for messages between my man and I. The cork board is for school newsletters and party invites and my receipt box it to keep all my tax invoices til I get around to entering them in the book when i do the BAS at the end of the quarter. I'm using the milk bottle for keeping pens and the mason jar for loose change. Eventually i'll be putting in some hooks up for our keys but for now they can just stay in the lock of the front door.

I'm hoping that all this helps me to keep up with everyone else's goings on and more importantly help me better my time management but i suppose i will just have to update this post later with how i go.