Seriously Organized: Finding God’s Order in My Chaotic Life as the Mom of 15

People are constantly accusing me of being “organized,” but I don’t think of myself in that way. 

However, the other day I started to ponder the idea, and I realized the reason I don’t connect myself with being organized is because the idea is linked with a specific definition in my mind. 

To me, an organized person is one who keeps her entire life categorized. She has specific times for specific activities (clean the coffee maker at 6:15 am, nurse the baby at 8:12).  

Each family member is assigned a color so she can keep track of their water cups, shoes, and underwear. This also helps her coordinate things such as dentist appointments and nail-clipping on a digital calendar hanging in a conspicuous spot on the wall in the kitchen.   

She has plans, but she also has contingency plans if those plans are thwarted. 

She uses apps or binders to keep track of addresses and numbers of everyone she does business with. Her paperwork is neatly filed away, and her files are always up to date.  

She knows what she will cook for dinner every night of the week and even has linked her menus to a grocery shopping app. 

She never runs out of toilet paper, shampoo, or gas in her car because all of her regular needs are taken care of on a rotating basis, for which she has set reminder rings on her phone. 

She never forgets a birthday and is always prepared for the next holiday. She keeps her nails manicured and her feet moisturized. 

She has formulated specific routines for each portion of her day, which she follows to perfection. 

Wherever she goes she glides; and all of her commitments go off without a hitch due to her controlled lifestyle. 

This is the image of the ultra-organized woman’s life which haunts me in the back of my mind. 

And here is my real life: 

I am the wife of one energetic, but retired, man; the mother of 15 children, the mother-in-law of eight spouses, and the grandmother of 20 grandchildren. 

All of these people need me in one way or another, even if only via concern and prayer, in different ways and at different times. 

Almost none of their needs are consistent or predictable. Their schedules are mostly erratic, and their needs vary according to age, availability, proximity, etc. And none of these variables are within my control. 

To sum things up: I rarely have an uneventful day. 

My life is like a flowing log drive; I am simply being carried along with the current, jumping from one log to another. 

I guess you could say that I gave up on that vision of being ultra-organized many years ago. Oh, that isn’t to say I never tried to get ahold of my life. I know what it means to try and lasso every circumstance, wrestle it to the ground and put my personal brand on it. 

Sometimes I’ve been successful, but not for long; thunder, lightning, blood, or Christmas always seem to get in the way. 

And yet, as I write this it is 12 p.m. I’m sitting in a coffee shop enjoying a latte Americano. I’m wearing stylish clothes that are clean, and my hair is done. I just came back from taking our autistic son to an appointment (which we were early for), and before that I published a post on three different platforms, had a delicious breakfast of cheese omelet and sourdough toast, and had some tea time with my husband for about a half of an hour before I left the house (which is generally clean and the laundry is caught up). 

I am not ultra-organized, I am seriously organized. 

This is because my life is not ordered on a surface level; it’s ordered on a spiritual level.  

That’s serious. 

And it must be that way, because any other way only leads to disappointment, frustration, nail-biting, and hypertension. 

But serious, spiritual organization allows time for me to sit in a cozy coffee shop and relax in a comfy chair on an overcast fall day as if I did not have a care in the world. 

What does this mean? 

It means the first thing I did today was to give my attention to the Presence of God. I enjoyed some worship music, did some scripture copywork, meditated, prayed, and listened…and when I felt released, I got out my prayer list and agenda for the day. 

I only trust myself with lists and appointments after I’ve allowed His peace to wash over me. If I attempt it any sooner, I plan from fear, and my stress level only rises. 

But when I write things down in trust, there is rest. 

I’ve learned to organize on a heart level rather than merely a cerebral level.  

You could say that I organize by faith. 

In my heart I’m saying, “Here are the things I’d like to accomplish, but I lay them down at Your feet. Help me be productive in Your ways and Your timing.” 

My lifestyle of serious organization is based on the Biblical idea expressed in this verse: 

A man’s heart plans his course, but the LORD determines his steps. 

Proverbs 16:9 

In case you were wondering, this does not mean that I never make plans or build routines. I could not live without these great helpers. 

There are two distinctives which make these part of my serious organizational lifestyle: 

1. I allow God to help me build these plans and routines so that they flow with His plans. 

2. I allow these plans and routines to be rerouted or forgotten altogether whenever is necessary, and I accept this with grace and expectation that God is going to help me keep on top of the log flow anyways. 

With these distinctives in mind, I would like to share some of them with you. But I don’t share them without a caveat. 

The caveat is this: These are the routines God has helped me create for my specific life situation.  

I suggest you take them more as an example or an inspiration, but never as direct application. If you do, you will end up a nail-biter, because you will have skipped the most vital part; relationship with Jesus.  

Walking with God, no matter how crazy that my look, is the fastest way to efficiency on our mission to love others and bring His Kingdom on earth as it is in Heaven.  

Any other way may bring about some worldly goal, but that goal may in turn lead people to hell. (The concentration camps in Nazi Germany were a model of efficiency—they kept meticulous records, which aided in their eventual prosecution.) 

Thank God, I’ll never be that successful at organizing my life. 

So, here is a brief outline of the ways in which I am seriously organized: 

1. I categorize. 

2. I delegate. 

3. I wash and fold laundry daily. 

4. I have chalkboards all over the place. 

5. My personal care is simple. 

6. I use zones. 

7. I see my days in blocks of time. 

8. I assign cleaning concentrations for each day of the week. 

9. I “centralize” items in our home. 

10. We have “stations” where we accomplish tasks. 

11. I create “flows.” 

12. I purge regularly. 

If I were to explain each item on the above list, it would make an entire book or take an entire day to capture as a podcast.  

Instead, I “plan” (as God wills) to take a few-at-a-time and go deeply into them so as to create a series of podcasts on being seriously organized.  

Does this sound swell to you? 

If it does, then stay tuned.  

Also, I hope you take advantage of my website, momdelights.com, as well as my substack as Mom Delights, which I am currently building up to include a freebies page and links to my homeschooling and mommy products.  

I do have a number of helpful things I have published, such as lesson books for the McGuffey readers and some commonplace books for notebooking with your children. I try to keep these as affordable as possible and most are available for free download.  

If you are interested, I have produced a planner which includes places for just about everything a large family mom would need. It is undated, which means it won’t be wasted even if you get off track for a while. 

Well, I hoped this has blessed you today! And I hope you will be watching for the next part of this series, where we will be covering categorizing, delegating, and laundry.  

You can purchase it pre-printed on Amazon.

Here are links to this post as a podcast: