Whether you have a full-time job or are a stay-at-home mama, one dilemma faces you every single day: what's for dinner? Make the answer easy by stocking your pantry with 12 staples, all sure to make mealtime a breeze. From fruits that stay fresh all year round to filling items like beans and pasta, these items are a must have for any time-strapped mom.
Today's busy families need smart solutions to stay organized, and the first place we most often turn to is: our phones! You'll find a plethora of apps designed to help keep your life in check by tracking appointments and daily chores, and syncing grocery lists and family calendars with your spouse's and kids' phones. Keep reading for our seven must-have apps (five of them are free!) to keep your family organized, and start downloading your way to a smoother schedule!
From the moment the alarm goes off each morning (if you're lucky enough to wake up to an alarm rather than an early riser!), the rush is on! Getting everyone washed, dressed, fed, and packed can seem like a sprint as you race against the clock to make it to school on time. Add to that some school permission forms that must be signed, a note for the teacher, and that sinking suspicion that there's nothing in the fridge for dinner that night, and the morning can be lost in a black hole.
Never fear, organized moms are here! We've scoured the web to find mamas who've got it under control, and they're sharing their tips (and products) to make your mornings run more smoothly. Keep reading for the best of what they've got to offer!
Clean up, clean up, everybody do your share! Mamas try their very best to keep things organized in the kids' rooms and playroom — but there's so much to be done that she needs a little helping hand. Get your tots to help out during cleanup time with these 9 adorable storage bins for kids.
A place for everything and everything in its place — so said Benjamin Franklin. With Spring cleaning well under way, we're looking at some ways to help organize your life by making the most hectic hours — the morning rush and dinnertime — run a bit more smoothly. But leave it to Martha Stewart to show us exactly how it can be done. We asked the editors of the Martha Stewart Living Organizing Special Issue to share their best strategies for involving the kids in home organization. Keep reading for five tips that are sure to get kids in on the action.
Photo by Eric Piasecki. Copyright 2012. Courtesy of the Martha Stewart Living Organizing 2012 Special Issue
We ooh and aah over the cute lil onesies and tiny lil booties our babies receive, but just where are they all supposed to go? Baby's dresser may have looked big when it was delivered, but once all of the layette items and gifts start rolling it, it's amazing how quickly you run out of space. If you've ever found yourself giving away baby's clothes that still have tags on them because you simply didn't know you had them, this post is for you! Check out our tips for organizing your lil one's clothes — with a few simple steps, you'll shave minutes off your morning dressing routine!
With Spring just around the corner, we're doing a lil Spring Cleaning around here and will be bringing you everything you need to clean up the playroom, your stroller, and your routine throughout the month. Ask most moms the biggest hurdle to having an organized home and you're sure to hear a chorus of "toys!" Sure, we try to keep our lil one's dolls, trucks, blocks, and puzzles under control, but there's just so much of it and so little space to put it in!
We turned to Sarah Giller Nelson, a Chicago-based professional organizer and the owner of Less is More (and a mom of two), for some advice on what to do with all those toys. According to Sarah, "There's always an accumulation of toys, it's just figuring out the right way to store them." Keep reading to see Sarah's suggestions!
Brain food! Everyone knows that good nutrition is essential to just about everything regarding tots' development — mental and physical. Feeding lil ones a balanced diet is a good rule of thumb, but there are certain foods that have proven positive benefits for healthy brain development. Unfortunately, telling kids that something is "good for them" isn't the appetite stimulant parents would hope for, and anyone who's ever tried to get a decent amount of green vegetables down the gullet of a stubborn toddler knows that healthy eating can be a challenge. Click through for breakfast, lunch, and dinner recipes chock full of brain-boosting ingredients so delicious the kids won't even have a moment to protest between bites.
It's no coincidence that dinnertime falls during the witching hour. While trying to make my kids a healthy dinner, I usually find one tot rifling through the pantry and another racing cars under my feet, until I turn on the TV in hopes of distracting them for 10 minutes so I can simply open the hot oven door without worrying that any lil hands will end up in there.
If this scene sounds familiar at all, then you — like me — are ready for a mealtime makeover. I spoke with kiddie-chef extraordinaire Catherine McCord, founder of Weelicious and mother of two, for some simple, proven tips for getting the kids out from underfoot and up helping to make weekday mealtime run smoothly. Check out her tips!
Source: Weelicious
The New Year means it's time to start organizing the areas of your life you've neglected, including out-of-sight (but awfully cluttered) kitchen drawers.
Are you guilty of buying more than one measuring spoon set, just to avoid hopelessly digging around your disorganized drawers? Has your junk drawer reached capacity? Speed up your search time and make your kitchen drawers safer and neater with our quick tips. Better organization cuts down on cleanup time for the whole family — and you won't drive yourself crazy searching for the liquid measuring cup ever again.
