Everyday Systems

So I wrote a whole thing and for some reason it didn't post. Oh well.

I am tracking four habits right now:

No-s: I am doing a four-meal version (breakfast, lunch, afternoon tea, dinner) that lines up well with my kids' schedules. It's going very well so far, no red days, and I think I'm eating less overall even on S-days and being more comfortable about it than I was on most days before I came back.

On-time: This one's mostly red right now, alas. I've noticed that I had a creeping problem with being late both in terms of frequency and in terms of total minutes. Not much success yet but I'm noticing that even when late I am not AS late as I was, so it's a work in progress.

Power-up and Power-down are my (N-day) morning and (night before N-day) evening routines. I mark green if the intent of the time was followed and the key task got accomplished - breakfast and lunch made for me and kids at power-up, post-dinner kitchen clean-up at power-down.

Best of luck to you! I can't work on more than one thing at a time, but then again I don't have multi-tasking mom experience.

Thanks!

Power-up and Power-down are contributing a lot to making No-S possible (otherwise there is not breakfast or it's a grab-and-go that feels too much like an early morning snack).

OnTime is not happening and I really REALLY need to fix that. Right now it's feeling like my need to set up compliance with No-S (make and eat substantial breakfast, plan and take lunch and tea) is making the rest of the morning lag just that little bit too much. Maybe it'll improve as No-S becomes a more solid habit? I'm not pleased with myself.

Tea sounds delightful. On S-days, I wanted to do Tea, but Americans don't easily have a spot for it. I like your systems approach

I stay on time by setting every clock in the house ahead by 4 minutes. I mean every clock including the one in the car. Do it when the kids aren't looking and they'll never notice. That way the time it takes to find coat, keys, get stuck at a red light, doesn't set you back. 4 minutes works because it definitely puts me out of the house "on time" but I don't account for it in my planning. If it gets any higher than I'm at risk of thinking, "Oh, I don't have to leave yet. I have extra time." You might have to work on finding your own sweet spot. I also set my timer for everything! including when I need to start to get ready to leave. That way if I'm folding laundry or some such thing, I don't get distracted. I know that when the timer goes off, I have to start to get ready to walk out the door.

Best of luck to you.