If you follow me on Instagram, you probably know that every Monday I start my week by changing my desktop background at work. These “new week new background” moments are pretty much the only thing getting me to work on a Monday morning – not gunna lie!!

I’ve had a few people ask me where I find all the images that I use for my backgrounds and the answer I usually give is “ummmm, the internet? I can’t remember!!” which is just not very helpful at all! I usually take an hour or so on a weekend and gather a TON of background images and save them in a folder so I can go for a few months choosing from images that I already have saved… so by the time I get to the end of my pictures I’ve genuinely forgotten where they’re all from. So now that it’s time for me to refresh my background picture folder, I thought I’d share some of my favorites and links so you can find and use them, too!

I definitely gravitate toward the brighter images for my desktop background (because let’s be honest I need something to make me happy since I’m staring at a computer all day) but I also like to switch it up and get some more subtle ones in there, too. I’ve definitely used some of these before (like the white with black dots and pink corner and the bright blue with ice cream cones filled with flowers) but they’re just so fun that I wanted to use them again! I can’t wait until the fall (aka December in Texas) so I can use the one that says Sweater Weather!

So here are some of the ones I collected last weekend to use over the next few months! Which one is your favorite? Have I convinced you to join the New Week New Background movement yet?!?!

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Does anybody else get hit with the “Sunday scaries” every single week? Well maybe not every week… but it happens quite a lot! That dread of *oh no I don’t want to go to work tomorrow* or *no I’m not ready for the weekend to be over yet* or *oh no I watched Netflix all day and didn’t get anything productive done and now I’m out of time!* It doesn’t feel great and it honestly doesn’t set you up for a good start to the week. I mean, starting out a brand new week feeling defeated and sad? No, thank you!!

I just hate going to bed on a Sunday thinking of all the things I should have gotten done and stressing about how now I have to do all those things during the week when I don’t really have the time. (Which is hilarious because I’m a single gal with no pets and I’m the least busy person I know but I still feel busy!!) I try my best to do ALL the things I can on Sunday to make sure that I am setting myself up to have the best start to the week as possible! Here’s what I’ve found works for me, and maybe it might work for you!

Plan Out Your Week

This is a good chance to assess what you got done over the weekend, what you didn’t get done, what you need to do during the week ahead, what plans you have coming up, etc. I like to make sure I know what my evening plans are for the week (do I have small group this week or is it a week off?), plan my workouts (if I want to do yoga on Thursday, I’ll need to wake up early and do it before work), and make note of anything I’ll need to pay special attention to (like a friend’s birthday coming up, so I better mail her card at some point this week!)

Brain Dump

Sunday during the day or at night is also a good chance to just get everything out of your head that might be worrying you or keeping you preoccupied as you go into a new week. (Want some more info on how and why to do a brain dump? Check out Brighton’s post here!) Getting all the worries and thoughts and things out of your brain and onto a page can really help calm my brain and help me sleep a lot easier – which is exactly what you want before starting a new week!

Grocery Shop

You know you have to eat, so go and get your groceries when you have the time! I always dread going to the store before I go, I tolerate it while I’m there, but then on Tuesday when I’m using the groceries that I bought, I’m SO glad that I got it out of the way on the weekend and I didn’t have to go to the grocery store after work and shop while starving, because that is the worst. I try and get it done before going to church (if I’m going to the late service) or right after church (if I went to the early service) – really I just love avoiding crowds and try to get it done as early as possible in the day!

Meal Prep

And now that you’ve actually gone and shopped for groceries, you might as well get some meal prep done. This is something that takes up so much time, and so it’s nice to get as much of it done as possible before the week starts. Really I just try to avoid having to make meals at 10pm after I get back from bible study because I’m tired. And doing meal prep at the beginning of the week will help me stick to my budget by not spending money on groceries AND spending money on expensive lunches downtown because I just didn’t make anything!

Look at your Budget

And speaking of budgets… it’s probably a good idea to take a peek at yours on Sunday. Seeing where you went crazy over the past week and where you still have some wiggle room will help keep you in the mindset of sticking to the budget you have set. Knowing that I only have X amount of money left in my “fun money” budget really helps me NOT spend $40 on random junk at Target during the week!

Tidy Your Space

If you didn’t get deep cleaning done over the weekend – that’s ok by me! But I always try to do some tidying on Sunday just so I start out the week uncluttered. Uncluttered space = an uncluttered mind… right? Is that how that works? I think that’s how that works. We’ll just go with that. So tidy up.

Set Out Your Outfits for the Week

This one here is an ultimate time saver! Picking out my clothes for the week and doing any cleaning or ironing that needs to be done on Sunday just has to be done. If I don’t get it done on Sunday, I will tell myself “oh I’ll just wake up early to iron that shirt” but guess what – I WILL NOT WAKE UP EARLY TO IRON THAT SHIRT and then do I have to pick something else or so I show up all wrinkly?!?! We can’t have that!

Move Your Body

Are you somebody that thinks that Sunday is the first day of the week or that Monday is the first day of the week? It’s both for me – I think that’s allowed! So for this one let’s all think that Sunday is the first day of the week… and it’s good to start off the week moving your body to get yourself in an exercise mindset for the rest of the week. This is something I haven’t been super great at, but I’m trying to really make sure I go for a walk or at least do a yoga video before going to bed!

Relax

It’s still the weekend! You should make sure that you take at least a little time for yourself before having to start the work week! Read a little in bed, do a face mask, catch up on the last week’s episode of The Bachelorette, go get an ice cream cone – the options are endless! Just as long as it brings you joy and gets you to relax a little bit!

Go to Sleep Early

This one is really a no-brainer, right? You don’t want to start your week sleep deprived! Go to bed early and get lots of good rest so you can start your week energized and rested!!

Like I mentioned in my post last week, something that I do from time to time to make sure I stay productive is calendar blocking. I don’t do it all the time (because it can sometimes seem a bit rigid and stressful, to be honest…) but when I need to buckle down and get things done, it can be really helpful. I’ve done this at work with my Outlook calendar, I’ve done this at home when I’m working from home, but sometimes I even do it at home when I’m NOT working aka for my regular life!

While I love a good to-do list (and y’all know that I do!!) it can still be easy to let some things slip through the cracks because oops you went and did other things or oops you took a long nap instead. And that’s ok. But sometimes you just really want to make sure that you get things done, and that’s where calendar blocking can help.

If you’re thinking “huh – is it just putting things on your calendar and scheduling out your day?” then you are RIGHT! It’s as easy as that! You think of all the things you need to do and all the things you want to do, and you throw them in your calendar. This is where it gets “fun” – you have to think about how long it will take you to do some tasks and what task-adjacent things should also go on your calendar. What would those be?!? Let’s look at mine from this past weekend and find out!

Let’s start with the task-adjacent items that I added to my calendar. On the first day, I went to brunch with some girlfriends. I could have just put the brunch on there, but I wanted to also add in the drive there and the drive home – those were task-adjacent.

As for other things, I just made my best guess as to how long certain tasks would take. Like going outside and walking/jogging for 3 miles – I know that’ll take about 45 minutes. But I go ahead and block off an hour on the calendar for it so I’ll have some wiggle room and will have time to go to the bathroom, drink water and stretch when I get home, etc. Other things like meal prep- based on what I had to make for the day, I figured that it would take me about 90 minutes. If it took less time – no biggie! Extra time to chill or work on something else! If it took more time – also no biggie! I could just move things around in the schedule or move a task to the next day. The great thing about calendar blocking is that you can be pretty free with it and adjust as you go.

I also try and make sure that I’m scheduling time for fun things when calendar blocking – that way it’s not just a rushed weekend where I feel like I didn’t get any rest. I am still working on a baby blanket that I’m crocheting for my newest nephew, so I made sure to schedule lots of crochet/tv time so I could relax and have some fun while still being productive! Other times, I’ve simply scheduled “free time” for an hour and I can just choose what I want to do in the moment – go get coffee, scroll through Instagram, run to Target, etc.

Is this method perfect? No! But is it helpful and worth trying? I think so! What is your favorite method for getting all your to-do list items done? Or do you hate lists all-together and hope for the best?!? Let me know!