saving time

Now that we are running after a toddler the vast majority of the time that we are home, we've found that it's really important to try to save time. All the walking a couple weeks ago, also caused us to dismantle what we affectionately called the "baby prison" gate from the living room surrounding the couch. It is now in the big barn room to cover the wood stove and drum set. Partly because we found that we were more inclined to let him wander and learn new things than being contained in one area. The barn room is now baby proof too!

Instead of installing hooks to keep the cabinets shut, that inadvertantly causes you to take a little more time opening the cabinet (we know this because the old cabinet doors already had them with the previous owners) and you have to put holes in the doors or risk scratching them (boo!). Instead we found this great baby proof cabinet box from onestepahead.com - It's called the Clean Guard. It also allows Aiden to access the harmless things in the cabinets that make great new toys to explore.

I've been making batches made our traditional pumpkin muffin recipe - but I switched it up in an effort to save my mommy time and made them into pumpkin bars! Instead of taking time to split them into muffin cups I saved time by just smearing the whole double recipe into a 2 inch tall edged cookie sheet. Woohoo, just as good (maybe better because they are all like muffin tops) and time saving!

I've been making batches of pasta that I can just splash with a little water and reheat a bit instead of waiting for the water to boil and the pasta to cook. And I don't have to worry about it being too hot for our little guy.

I'm guessing that to save some time on milder days when transfering the baby from school to the warmed up car, it will work to use a blanket in lieu of bundling him up just for the quick jump to the car. I was day dreaming that on these chilled evenings it would be nice to have a heated stroller so that we could still cruise. Although we're lucky that Aiden is such a hot box because he never seems to get cold. Good circulation that he did not get from his mama.


Night time diapers (by Huggies - they are great!) are actually saving us time because we don't have to wash the sheets all the time when our little one would get messy. It's nice when he sleeps that well but geesh these diapers are brillant.

Anybody have any other good time saving ideas?