Happy Monday!
Once again, my favorite day of the week rolls around. I know it's so weird, but I just love Mondays. I really do. It's like New Year's, but it comes every week - a blank page, the chance for a fresh start, the opportunity to decide what I want to do with the chunk of time stretched out in front of myself.
We have big plans for the day: getting caught up from the weekend, doing normal-day stuff, and running a few errands. Kind of boring, I know, but I'm ready for it.
One of the things Todd has mentioned before is that you know you're doing Sunday right if you end up looking forward to Monday, and I think that's true. I really think that over the course of the last few years, as we've chosen to be more intentional with how we spend and protect our Sundays, the happier I've been with the chance to get back to work on Monday.
Like the masses, we call Sunday, "Sunday Funday." We talk it up all week to the kids, we look forward to it, we protect it, we prepare for it in advance. Church is the obvious and first activity of the day, so a lot of our preparations revolve around that.
I shower on Saturday night so I don't have to spend as much time blow drying my hair before church. I make a pan of baked oatmeal on Friday or Saturday so I don't have to cook breakfast, and we serve it in paper bowls so I don't have dishes to do. All the kids' church clothes are kept in one closet on the main floor, so laying out their clothes takes about five minutes. (I can post a video I recorded a while back with our church closet organization, if anyone's interested.) We try to streamline the morning as much as possible.
After church, we grab lunch to bring home. It makes lunch so easy to serve and clean up, and gives the kids the feeling of it being a 'special' meal. Sometimes it's something small like McDonald's, sometimes it's brisket from a local barbecue place (and currently, with this pregnancy, a lot of times I run into Hu Hot and make myself a to-go bowl because Mama's never not hungry for stir fry). We get home, and we all change into jammies right away before sitting down to eat. After lunch, the kids play for a bit, Todd and I spend some time debriefing after church. After that, it's naptime.
Everyone at our house naps on Sundays, even the grownups. (Admittedly, I prefer not to nap, but to just sit and enjoy the absolute stillness on my own, but this pregnancy has worn me out and I often fall asleep on the couch before naptime even officially starts.) The whole afternoon is taken up with naptime, and it's glorious.
After naps, we serve cereal for dinner, which sounds super low key, but is really wonderful. There's no cooking, no planning, no leftovers to box up. We serve it in paper bowls, so again, no clean up. The kids think it's a party, everyone wins. (Todd and I usually scrounge up leftovers or something, since cereal doesn't exactly fill us up.)
After dinner, we all cuddle up together on the big sectional and watch a movie together. I usually spend the time folding the week's clean laundry so I don't have to do that throughout the week. Plus, I really get restless just sitting in front of the TV with nothing to do with my hands, so it's a great time to kill two birds with one stone. After the movie's over, I pass out stacks of folded laundry for kids to put away, and everyone heads to their beds for their bedtime routines with Todd. (I don't really do bedtime - praise the Lord for a husband who is willing to muster the energy required for those shenanigans).
And at that point, Todd and I do whatever we need to in order to wrap up the weekend - sometimes we still have Family Table stuff to go over, sometimes we read for a bit, and often we just curl up on the couch and watch Netflix.
We almost never waver from this routine if it can be at all prevented. We don't go to Super Bowl parties or after-church lunches. We avoid pretty much anything we can that takes away from family time, and we don't really work around the house on principle. The entire day is so restful and slow and recharging, but it's also sufficient rest and slowness to feel ready to get back to our normal pace of life, which is what I love about it. It's not the kind of leisure that makes me feel like continuing to indulge past the point of helpfulness. It's limited, and it feels limiting, and that's actually one of its best qualities.
Sunday Funday is actually why I've stopped posting blogs on Mondays. I actually write each day's post the day ahead, and I wasn't enjoying having an obligation hanging over my head to get accomplished at some point on Sunday. (And I'm not organized enough to write one further in advance than that.) So Monday posts are a thing of the past (after this, obviously), and I couldn't be happier about it.
Now. Now that Sunday's over, it's time to party it up for MONDAY FUNDAY! Trip to Drop Off Old Crap at Goodwill, here I come!
4 comments :
What happened to your pasta nights? Did you get burnt out? It's nice to change it up a bit at times. :-)
I love to see a video or blog post of your Sunday church clothes organization. Our oldest two dress themselves and I don't care what they choose. I might care if they chose something really dark or shabby but they love dresses so it's never an issue. Then they are tasked with picking out fancy church outfits for their little brothers. :-) It always tickles me to see what they come up with. But if I cared more about coordination and color schemes or something, I think your idea sounds great!
We have never done a ton specifically to really protect Sundays. I like the idea of that, though. We do always go out for lunch so Mom doesn't have to prepare or recover from meals and we always have rest times in the afternoon.
*I would love to :)
Another thing I thought about with Mondays is that I hate my husband leaving us on Mondays! I accept it and I think in many ways we are more productive because of routine, but I do kind of feel like I am grieving on Sundays in a minor way because he will leave us on Monday for work and we majorly celebrate Fridays because of the opposite. :-) Do you feel any of this?
i like the idea of Monday Funday. the Sunday Funday hashtag is well utilized, but Monday Funday is borderline social heresy. be prepared to be brought up on charges!
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