Regain Control of Your Home in One Weekend

Life gets busy, and time has a way of getting away from us. This results in an unorganized, chaotic home life that adds to your daily frustration. It doesn't take long for things to get out of hand. A hectic schedule leaves little time for cleaning, organizing, or taking care of simple tasks, like calling someone to come over and handle appliance repair. Before you know it, the house is so out of control it feels overwhelming. Fortunately, you can regain control of your home in just one weekend by trying the following tips.

Tackle the To-Do List

If you don't already have an actual list of all that needs to be done around the house, begin by making one. Include anything that needs to be repaired, painted, or replaced. Walk around the entire house while making the list so that nothing is forgotten. Once it is complete, get to work. Set aside an entire Saturday for this job, as it is the biggest step in regaining control of your home. Don't worry if there are a few jobs on the list that you can't do yourself. Make appointments with professionals that can help instead of worrying about them.

Do a Thorough Cleaning

Save the better part of Sunday for cleaning. This isn't a simple dusting and vacuuming type of cleaning. Get right in there with a bucket of soapy water and scrub everything. Launder window treatments, and have the carpeting deep cleaned. You can find the professional carpet cleaning austin has available, like WOW Total Cleaning, by doing an online search. Scour sinks, tubs, and toilets with a commercially available cleaner that is gentle on these surfaces yet strong enough to remove stains.

Get Organized

The final step in regaining control of your home is to organize everything. Hang keys, bags, and other items you always take with you near the door (check Target or Amazon for the perfect items). Keep a pre-packed bag ready for the gym there too. Start keeping a grocery list on the refrigerator where it is quick and easy to jot down items you need. Designate a specific area for the mail and bills. Rearrange closets, cupboards, and drawers if you need too. The goal is to allow everything to run smoothly.

By tackling the to-do list, doing a thorough cleaning, and organizing your home, you will have a house that is refreshing to come home to at the end of each day. Now that everything is under control, work out a weekly schedule of simple tasks to be done that will keep everything tidy and on track. You will be amazed at how much of your stress will be relieved.

               

How to Prepare for College Life

The thought of starting college can be exciting, as it will allow you to study a subject that complements your passion, help you make many new friends and embrace different experiences.

However, various obstacles could stand in your way, such as financial setbacks, a lack of social skills or an academic jump from high school. To ensure you are 100% ready, read the following tips on how to prepare for college life.

Organize Your College Tuition and Fees

Unless your parents have saved for your college tuition throughout the years, you might be unsure how you will fund college life after high school. It is, however, possible to receive financial aid by applying for various scholarships.

For example, if you are a gifted athlete, you should find out more about ASM scholarships, which is a recruitment platform that can help students to connect with coaches and to secure an average of $30,000 per year to fund their tuition, room, board, and university fees. 

Boost Your Social Skills

Every student will need to possess exceptional communication skills to thrive in college. After all, you will need to communicate with your professors, classmates, and other personnel from your first day. It could be beneficial to attend the general orientation and to join various clubs to make friends and work on your social skills. It might also help to enroll on a course that can improve your soft skills prior to attending college.

Read as Many Books as Possible

The transition from high school to college can be a big academic jump, as you will be required to read a substantial number of books. It is wise to get a head start by using the summer before college to read as many books as possible on your reading list, which will ensure you’re bursting with knowledge on the first day of your freshman year. Reading various textbooks could also help you to choose a college major, which you will be required to pick on day one.

Download a Time Management App

College students are responsible for their academic performance, as a professor won’t chastise them if they miss an important class or fail to hand in a big paper. If you want to pass a test or paper with flying colors, you will need to effectively manage your time. It might be worthwhile to download a time management app, which will ensure you don’t miss an important deadline, study session, class, or social event.

Find a Job Before College

The last thing you will want is to worry about finances during college, as it could distract you from your studies. A part-time job will ultimately boost your cash flow, so you will never run short of money for clothing, groceries, textbooks, and social events. It might, therefore, be worthwhile securing a job before college, and you should improve your financial literacy to ensure you can effectively manage your money, which can help you to avoid debt and grow your savings.

Health-Boosting Habits That Are Seriously Low Effort

We all want better health, right? However, the effort and time that many healthy habits require us to put in can be a real barrier to success. After all, what busy mummy do you know that can spend two hours at the gym every day, and get a good 10 hours of sleep a night? The good news is that there are some habits you can get into that are great for your health, but only require a small effort. Something you can read more about in my post below. 

Swap out your nightly chocolate bar 

Did you know that the average chocolate bar contains around 5 grams of sugar? Oh and don't even get me started on sports drinks (approx 9 grams). Of course, eating so much sugar on a daily basis isn't great for you. In fact, it can not only hurt the health of your teeth but can lead to blood sugar spikes and weight gain as well. 

That is why one of the most critical health-boosting habits swaps you can make is to trade out your cup of tea and chocolate for something better. Now, I'm not saying you should replace your evening chocolate treat with a piece of fruit, although that could work well. Instead, why not consider having a protein bar, or something homemade and full of whole foods? It could really make all the difference to your health. 

Vape instead of smoke 

We all know by now that smoking is terrible for us. Of course, those of us that are parents also have the added worry that this habit, primarily used to relieve stress in the short term, will be the cause of health problems that will cut our lives short, and prevent us from seeing our kids mature as well. 

Obviously, this means if there is a less harmful option, it is well worth choosing it. Of course, the best option here is to give up completely, something that can be hard to do but certainly is worthwhile. Although, if it were that easy, we'd all have done it already!

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In fact, giving up smoking can be one of the most challenging things we ever have to do, and it certainly isn't low effort. That where nicotine replacement products like nicolites vapes come in. The idea being that you still get your nicotine fix, but without all the other nasty chemicals that cigarettes contain. This being something that can have a positive impact on your health compared to smoking. 

Of course, the other significant advantage is by using an e-cigarette you get a very similar smoking experience but are still making a positive change for your health. One that may make giving up entirely that little bit closer as well. 

Spritzers need less wine 

Another very low effort swap that you can make to boost your health concerns the amount of alcohol you drink. Again asking people to stop completely is likely to be unrealistic here, although there is evidence to show that this is the best action for a healthy life. 

Instead, it's all about keeping elbow the current recommended limit of 14 units a week. Which in real terms, work out as about 7 medium glasses of wine. The thing is by using a mixer in your drinks you can still enjoy that glass once the kids have gone to bed every night, but cut your consumption in two. 

In fact, if you use diet lemonade or soda, you can cut the calories you are drinking as well. Which is another health benefit you can achieve with minimal effort! 

Walking the kids home from school 

Exercise is good for us in so many ways, but with a busy life of a working parent getting enough can be tough. Of course, many of us pick up the little ones from school and nursery, and that is an excellent opportunity to get at least some of the recommended 10,000 steps a day.

Now, I say pick them up because getting them dressed, fed, ready, and out the door in the morning is likely to be something of a challenge already, and adding extra time for a walk into this can be a real pain. Instead it's much more realistic to walk to the school to get them at the end of the day, and then walk them home again. 

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You'll even miss the daily bundle for car parking spaces as close to the school as possible, which makes this low effort health-boosting habit a double win. 

Make Your Homeschooling Workspace More Inviting for the Kids

While summer break is in full swing and you are giving the kids a little time off from their homeschooling studies, now can be the perfect time to take a look at your set-up with a critical eye. There is a lot that goes into homeschooling, and making sure that your kids not only follow along with the work but also excel - and part of that is the environment in which you plan to teach them. If the teaching and studying space in your home feels lackluster and uninspiring to you, then you can bet the kids are feeling the exact same way.

Here we’ll take a look at how you can give your school space a makeover, making it a whole lot more engaging for kids to be in.

Let in the Natural Light

One of the best ways to inject some energy, creativity, and focus into your kids is to make sure their workspace has as much natural light as possible. It could be as simple as opening up the drapes, or it may involve reconfiguring where their workspace is. If natural light just isn’t going to happen, then you need to be sure their space is well-lit with artificial light.

5 Benefits of Consolidating Your Debts

A debt consolidation loan is often advised as a worthwhile financial situation for people who are juggling a lot of different debts. Debt consolidation loans can be used to repay all current debts in full, consolidating them all into the new loan and leaving the individual with just one interest rate and one monthly repayment to worry about when it comes to the money that they owe. If you are struggling with managing several different debts and are not in a financial position to repay them all yourself, a debt consolidation loan can have several benefits that are worth considering. These include:

#1. Improve Your Credit Score:

By repaying everything that you currently owe with your debt consolidation loan, you will close your accounts with your creditors and this can improve your credit rating significantly. In addition, your credit rating is not just determined by how much you owe, but how many creditors you owe money to – having a lot of smaller debts can be even worse than just having one larger debt, therefore using one loan to pay off several small ones can have a positive impact here.

#2. Save Money:

In the long term, paying off your debts with a debt consolidation loan can mean that you’ll save money. Depending on the interest that you’re paying on your current debts, switching them all over to just one loan with one interest rate to pay could mean that you’re saving a considerable amount of money over the long run. In fact, you may even begin to notice savings straight away when your one monthly repayment is a lot less than you’d pay in total towards several debts.

#3. Less Stress:

There’s no denying that making one repayment to one loan every month is going to be less stressful than making several repayments to different lines of credit. You won’t need to worry about making sure that you have money available for the different repayments on different days, as it’ll all be taken out at once and the rest of your money is now free to do whatever else you need or want to do with it.

#4. Repay Faster:

In many cases, you may even be able to repay your total amount of debt faster when you take out a debt consolidation loan. For example, if you have a loan with a repayment term of four years, paying it off with a debt consolidation loan from simplepersonalloans.co.uk with a shorter term means that you’ll get rid of your debt faster without having to worry about paying more.

#5. Free Up Credit:

Last but not least, if you’ve maxed out your credit card and can’t afford to pay it all off at once, then a debt consolidation can help you do that – freeing up the credit for you to use in the meantime. Just make sure that you use it responsibly to keep on top of your credit score and avoid further financial difficulty.

These are just some of the great reasons anyone juggling several debts should consider consolidating them with a loan.