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As if coming up with a daily schedule for a family isn’t hard enough, in the season that I write this we are also in the midst of the pandemic quarantine in March/April of 2020. No worries, if we’ve passed through all that craziness what you’ll read here is still totally relevant. A daily schedule for your family will be what I would argue is the best thing you could do for your family. If you’ve ever felt like you’re running around all the time this is for you. If can’t ever seem to get started on a task…or finish one, a daily schedule for your family is what you need. Creating a family schedule to use every day is for you if your kids create a constant tornado in your home (because they don’t know what they should be doing). A daily schedule for your family is going to save you time, annihilate overwhelm, create better relationships between you and your kids & decrease the amount of fighting between your kids. AND, it will give you all the ability to have more time for doing what you want every day. A family daily schedule couldn’t be easier!

Sound good?

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Before you keep reading, make sure to get your free daily family worksheet so you can fill yours out as you go. It’s free, just tell us where to send it!

YES PLEASE!

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Before we get started, here are some things to keep in mind.

• This process will get easier the more you do it
• You won’t necessarily create a new one every day
• This will work best if you create a schedule for you & every kid who is old enough to read
• Set aside 10-15 minutes every time you fill out a new schedule

If you find yourself suddenly homeschooling, make sure to grab our homeschool planning worksheets by clicking on the graphic below! (these are also free!)

This process is how you create a daily scheduled for a family – using time blocks

(this post may contain affiliate links. If you make a purchase, I may receive a small commission at no cost to you)

First it works best to use pencil or erasable pens. If you have not discovered the joy of erasable pens yet, you will never use a different kind of pen again. THESE RIGHT HERE are my favorite.

While there are many details to fill in, a SIMPLE daily schedule for your family is the goal. This planning worksheet HERE is designed to be simple and to get you thinking and planning your day in time blocks.

Would you like to watch this in a video? Just click below to watch a training I gave on this very post.

What is a time block?

A time block is a clearly defined block of time, with a start and end time, when you are focused on similar tasks.

Does that thought stress you out? Do you worry about having a day that is too structured?

If it sounds like time blocks will block you in, there is an easy piece that you must apply with your time blocks.

White space.

What space or time scheduled for “overflow” after each time block is essential. That way if the items listed in your time block take longer than planned, you’ll have some wiggle room to work with. In some cases you’ll have to move tasks to a different time, but a simple 20 to 30 minutes white space after each time block allows you the freedom to have planned activities at planned times without being booked into back to back time blocks.

A simple daily schedule for families in time blocks looks like this:

MORNING ROUTINE
BREAKFAST
MORNING TIME BLOCK
LUNCH
AFTERNOON TIME BLOCK
DINNER
EVENING TIME BLOCK
EVENING ROUTINE

The morning routine time block (2 hours)

You should have your morning routine, and so should your kids. A morning routine consists of simple things you do every morning.

I’ve suggested a schedule for you below, but your kids’ morning routine should include their wake up time, some basic self care (like getting dressed), and likely a few chores (we call them responsibilities). For example, making their bed, taking care of pjs, and being ready for breakfast at the breakfast time block time.

Here’s a suggested morning routine for moms

It starts with getting up before your kids. I know, I know. If you struggle to get up before your kids you might like our Home CEO Life Planner HERE. There are all kinds of helpful resources including a worksheet about getting up early as well as how to determine the right time for you to get up based your needs, your family, and your roles. There is also a Morning Routine Template you can download for free HERE.

This is what a great morning routine could be for you:

• 30 minutes exercise
• then, 30 minutes for you – morning routine
• 30 minutes jumpstart on the house

That way you’ve started your day with a full 90 minutes to use on your own. Yes, it’s possible to have your kids get up and out of bed at the right time, my 9 kids are proof of that. Again, you will find Home CEO Life Planner helpful for this.

Set your morning routine to end art the time your kids get up. This accounts for the other 30 minutes in the morning routine time block.

The breakfast time block (1 hour)

This is what a great breakfast time block looks like.

• Prep breakfast (or prep it the night before)
• Eat breakfast
• Start dinner (yes, make as much of your planned dinner as you can during the breakfast time block)
• Clean up breakfast

Individual time (30 minutes)

This is a basic catch up time that I mentioned above. Everyone will be doing their own thing here. If people don’t have anything specific to catch up on, it’s free time (with planned free time activities to keep the kids from creating that tornado).

Family activity – planned (2 hours)

This will look different for everyone. the key is to assign something specific to each person. And, this is where the free worksheet HERE comes in so handy. You can fill in what each person is to be doing during this time.

Here are some ideas to get you going.

• School
• Craft
• Reading
• Home project

Break (20 minutes)

This could be another white space time if needed, but ideally this would just be a time for everyone to kind of decompress for a bit.

House tidy (10 minutes)

Nothing is more stressful for everyone than a messy house. While I realize 10 minutes isn’t very much time, a lot can get put in a temporary holding place to clean up better later. Come up with some shortcuts to clean up quick. You can get some more ideas on how I do that HERE.

Lunch (1 hour)

This is a pretty straight forward time block. Here’s how a simple lunch time block could look.

• Prep
• Eat
• Clean up
• Quiet activity 20 minutes

This is another white space time block if needed, but ideally this is a time for everyone just to wind down with a quiet individual activity.

Individual work 2 hours (quiet)

This will look different for everyone, but again, everyone has specific things they are to be doing in this time block. If you’ve got kids doing school at home, this should be the time when they are doing their hardest work. This is to be a quiet time, which means it’s nap time or quiet time for the younger kids.

Remember, making a daily scheduled for everyone in your family who needs to know what they are to be doing is how your daily schedule for your family will work best.

Here’s what this time block could look like to give you some ideas

• School
• Teaching
• Housework
• Nap or quiet time
• Quiet activity time like reading, puzzles

Free time (think of this as the after school period) (1.5 hours)

This time can be filled with all kinds of things.

• What sorts of things do your kids like to do when they get home from school?
• Do they have chores or responsibilities?
• Is there schoolwork or homework that needs to be done?
• Do you have house tasks to get done?

Time outside here is a great thing if it’s available. In our family, responsibilities, schoolwork, and homework come first. But, once those things are taken care of this is truly free time.

As with any free time, give your kids some acceptable activities to do during this time. If left on their own, your kids will probably have too much free time. So, there will be more fighting and messes. More boredom and complaining.

Tidy (30 minutes)

One primary purpose of another tidy in the day is that it makes the job easier at the end of the day. In addition, it just feels good when your home, especially the common living ares, are more peaceful and less chaotic.

I don’t know about you, but a messy home sure feels chaotic.

Dinner (1 hour)

The prep work for dinner should have been done, at least in part, during your breakfast time block. You’ll find that when you get as much of the prep work out of the way as possible, your dinner time will be so pleasant.

It is so hard to make dinner during what I call “the witching hour.” It is so nice to get to dinner time and have to do little more than put it in the oven, your night gets so much better!

Here’s what a simple dinner time block looks like:

• Prep
• Eat
• Clean up
• Evening clean up (1 hour)

This is the time to really get things cleaned up from the day. If you had a temporary place to put things during the day, now is the time to empty those places out and put them away.

This is also a time to finish the dinner clean up if that wasn’t done earlier.

To make this time go smoothly and also to get the most done, assigning chores (or responsibilities) to each person is the way to go.

When everyone has a set of tasks and knows what they should be doing, it’s much easier to get the right things done every day.

Family time (30 minutes)

This is our favorite time of the day. Oftentimes we have older kids missing who aren’t at home, but we try to make the timing on this be such that the most people can be there.

So, sometimes we might swap this time with some of the evening routine things listed below. But, this is a time when we are often reading aloud, maybe watching a favorite show (we have two), or playing a game.

But think of things your family enjoys doing together. Or, this could be the perfect time to start something new.

Evening routines

The evening routine is a time where everyone may be doing their own thing, but everyone knows what they should be doing.

An evening family routine could look as follows:

• Free time
• Bedtimes/routines
• School work
• Responsibilities
• Tying up loose ends

Your evening routine

Just like you should have your own personal morning routine, you should also have a 30 minute evening routine.

This is a great time to reflect on your day, plan some of your day tomorrow, and just spend some time winding down with something you enjoy.

You’ll find a sample evening routine in our Home CEO Life Planner HERE

If you want a more time for doing what you want as well as a more peaceful home, creating a daily schedule for your family is the answer.

Are you looking for a school schedule for kids that works? Make sure to click on the graphic below to grab our school planning worksheets – one for moms and one for kids!