This shop has been compensated by Collective Bias, Inc. and its advertiser. All opinions are mine alone. #CambialoConQS #CollectiveBias
Wow, the last few weeks have been flying by, I can’t believe how busy I have been. Between homeschool, three kids five and under, writing, my craft business and my book business, planning Maggie’s sixth birthday party last weekend, a football bash on Sunday and now Henry’s second birthday party this Saturday, I’ve been busy. I’m talking, seriously busy and I’m exhausted. To be honest, all of my weeks are pretty busy, the parties just kick it up a notch. No matter how busy I am, I really try to keep it fun for us, so I’ve learned a few ways to save some time while getting it all done and I’m here to make your day by sharing them with you.
My first tip is to unload your dishwasher first thing in the morning. Instead of letting dishes pile up all day, just load the dishwasher back up as you go.
My second simple tip is to put away the laundry immediately after you fold it. Even if you do 10 loads a day, put it away each time. It only takes a minute instead of an hour to empty a bunch of laundry baskets. Plus, the kids do a good job of putting away a handful of laundry at a time. Getting their help for multiple baskets, not so much.
My third tip is simple. Plan your errands all at once. Whenever possible, get all of your running done in one swift shot. We live out in the country a bit, even a drive to the nearest store is 15 minutes for us, but any store to do more than grocery shop is at least a half hour away. Being able to get all of our shopping and stopping done in one trip frees up so much time for the stuff we really care about.
My fourth tip is plan ahead. Make a list of every place you have to stop and what you have to do or get while you are there. I even set up my grocery list by area in the store, otherwise, I guarantee that we will walk back through half of the aisles at least three times. I keep a pen with me and check it all off as we go.
My fifth tip is multitask whenever possible. Here’s an example using my most recent trip to Walmart. I brought my shopping list with us. Before we even started shopping, we went in through Walmart’s Auto Care Center. I was long overdue for an oil change and there just wasn’t time for John to do it himself or for us to make a separate trip while I try to wrangle three young kids while we wait for it to be done somewhere else. This way, I could get my shopping done while we got my oil changed. John’s always telling me how expensive it is to get my oil change so he did a double take when I told him that the Pit Crew Oil Change with Quaker State ® Advanced Durability Motor Oil was only $19.88.
We set off to do our shopping, with me thinking that maybe I should pick up a new outfit since I was saving a bunch of money. The kids were starving because we clearly cannot go more than an hour before somebody withers away to nothing, so they got some food from the deli and we finished up our shopping. We paid for our things and were starting to head to the auto center when they called to say they were just about finished with our truck. Perfect timing, right? The kids had fun peeking out to see what they were doing and asking questions.
We paid for our oil change and off we went. Living so far out, we put a lot of miles on the car. Knowing we had dependable Quaker State® Advanced Durability™ oil in our truck gives me peace of mind to get on with the things that really matter in life. Like fun and games with these crazy kids, some wood sign making and whatever else we end up doing. 
This particular day, we ended with so much awesomeness. Maggie is just learning to read on her own. She had recently started reading book two in her reading set, but had only read the first three pages. Today was different though, today she read the entire book. She was so proud of herself and I was so proud of her and so excited that I got to be there for this little big moment.
