You get the weekend you want. You get what you want when you intentionally pursue it, when you’re clear on what you want and you pursue it. And that is what I would love for all women to be, is to be clear on what they want and know how to get it. 

And the reason we want to be intentional is because we can get to the end of the weekend and we think “ah” I didn’t do what I wanted to do. I didn’t get done. what I wanted to do. Oh my gosh, it’s Monday. I just don’t even feel ready for the week. Or they can feel like, oh, I did too much. I don’t really feel rested. It was kind of a rat race weekend. 

And so that feels horrible and you feel regret. And what I want is for you to be able to get through the weekend and to say, that was awesome. That’s the weekend that I wanted, that’s the weekend that I planned for. 

And that does not mean that the weekend went exactly according to a specific time plan, but you had the result you wanted over the weekend. And so, let me be specific, on. What the result is that you might want on the weekend? Like, for example, for me, I wanna get to Monday morning and I want to feel ready for Monday. 

I also want to feel very rested and recharged and rejuvenated. So if I’m going to be ready for Monday, that means that I have to intentionally start doing that on Saturday. And so I’m gonna talk to you about how I plan for that, because I wanna wake up on Monday. I have a 6:00 AM client on Monday, 6:00 AM So I wake up at four 30.

But I wanna feel. Restored and rejuvenated and not exhausted. Come Monday morning because I’ve over planned my Sunday or waited till the last minute and just did a whole bunch of things on Sunday and never really thought that I got the benefit of my Sabbath and rest. So through much trial and error, I have come up with a new system. 

Now before I get started, I want to address the concept of being spontaneous and spontaneity. And I don’t think there’s anything with being spontaneous, if it’s getting you what you want. If you get to the end of the weekend and you were like, oh my gosh, I just woke up and I did whatever I wanted and I had all these opportunities come up, and I either said yes or I said no, but I loved my reasons for it.

And I included it in my weekend, and it just felt so fun and exciting. My husband is a real person who says he loves spontaneity, which is great, but he often gets to the end of the weekend and is disappointed because he didn’t either do what he wanted because the opportunity didn’t just like, fall on his lap to be spontaneous or he didn’t plan it.

And so what’s interesting is he believes that he likes spontaneity, which is fine, but I’m always questioning that because I think he would really prefer to have a lot more activity in his and in his weekend to see him being judgy, misjudged her on it and like actively planning things than he potentially could get to the end of the weekend and be like, oh, there was so much adventure. It was so full. I really enjoyed it. 

So if you love spontaneity, totally fine and you love, keep, you do and you love doing that, then just keep doing it. Another concept with spontaneity is if you say, well, I love spontaneity, but I often get wrangled into doing things out of obligation. You know, when people call, I feel obligated to say yes.

So I would encourage you to potentially work on the skill of assessing how you feel when people give you an invitation and saying, let me get back to you, and just checking in with your body and you can decide, do I love my reasons for going? Is this something I want to do this weekend? And whether you go or not, just love your reasons. Okay. 

So I’m sure there’s lots of questions and there’s many scenarios that I am not covering, but I want you to know that what I am going to lay out is really working for me, and I’m really digging it. I’m really digging it because I have started to identify the things that I love doing on the weekends. So when the weekends come, I’m so excited about them. 

Now, before I tell you that I have created a pseudo weekend. Which means that I like to work Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and then on Thursday, I call it my Saturday. Thursday is the day that I typically take to spend. A good chunk of time. I started it with three to four hours of free time.

I would not plan it, it would be three to four hours. I didn’t plan on going out with friends. I didn’t plan anything because that’s what I like. I like having free time, not spontaneity, but free time. I guess it’s spontaneity to just kind of do whatever I feel like doing in the moment. I call it my Saturday because I’m a mom.

My kids are in high school, and I actually started this when they were in junior high, and what I noticed is that I would be exhausted after the weekends and I needed to have some bit of time that could just be mine and I could be quiet and I could schedule to do whatever I wanted and. That way, that whatever the schedule was over the weekend, I would not be so bitter.

I would feel like I was taken care of, and it became a bright spot in my week to where I could work harder, push through some unpleasant tasks, knowing that Thursday was my time. And there’s been some times I have intentionally worked on Thursday because I chose that I wanted to get it done or I didn’t wanna do it on a different day.

But I’ll tell you, my Thursdays are my special treats. So I guess I just wanna tell you that because I’m gonna tell you about my weekend. And then, now I’m in volleyball season. So there’s the Denise ideal weekend, and then there’s the real weekend. 

And that’s what I would encourage you to start with is, if you could spend the weekend and  there were no other humans influencing your weekend, what would you do? How would you like to spend it? 

And you might not be able to give like a blow by blow, hour by hour. Account, but you know the things you want to include. And through trial and error, I have created that list. And so come Thursday night, I have my list of about  14 different things that I have found that if I get to by the end of the weekend, I feel really great.

It makes me feel happy, and every weekend I don’t get a chance to do these things, but I find that this is sort of like a success formula. So you can start there with what are the things that I love, and if you don’t know what they are, you can just take the next month to create your ideal weekend list.

Just open your eyes to be like, oh, that was great. I love that. And maybe you’re going to identify things that you love. You don’t wanna do it every weekend, but man, it was so great to go to coffee with that friend. Oh my gosh, it was so great to go for a long weekend. I really loved going to see a play that was so fun.

And that’s one of the things my husband and I love doing. I don’t think I wanna do that every weekend because we live in Chicago, so we usually go into the city or we live in the suburbs. But again, I know I don’t wanna do that every weekend, but I do know what I wanna do. 

So I’m gonna go through the things that I have found are my faves, and so number one is creating your list and you can add to it and change it, and you can take a month to find out what it is that you love. The second thing. Is to plan, to plan it. The things that you love. 

Okay, so I have this like a standard template, and then for each weekend, there might be, like a project that I want to do or something that’s specific like. Doing the carpool. That’s not every weekend, but for this coming weekend, I definitely wanna make sure that I get the snack food schedule done for my son’s volleyball team.

So you might have some specific things just for that weekend that you want done or that you want to indulge in. And enjoy then plan to plan it. Okay, so I plan on Thursday nights, my schedule is loose based on what I know. And this will all make sense once I get going. 

And then once I get into the weekend, you guys,  I’m like committed to it, but I’m also really flexible and I’m just intentional. If I change something, I just love my reasons for changing it. Or at least like my reasons or just realize it’s my choice if I change it.

And I don’t do this to be perfectionistic, I do this because I have found it’s a way for Denise to turn her face to making sure that she is cared for and not neglected. I have this old thought  that people will forget me.  

I guarantee it’s like a brokenness and wound thing, and I just always say, Denise, I won’t forget you. I won’t forget you. So even if I don’t get a chance to do one of these things and it doesn’t work out, I’ll say, I didn’t forget that’s important to you. We’ll do that next weekend. 

It’s totally fine that we didn’t do it. It doesn’t mean you’re not worth it. It just means we’re not doing it this weekend. It just didn’t work out. For example, one of my loves is that because I wake up every morning with an alarm during the week at 4: 35 or maybe five 30 on  the weekends, I love doing this thing. I call it marathon sleep.

And it is where I go to bed. And I make a challenge for myself to see how long I can stay in bed the following day. I know you guys who have kids are like, you can really do that. Yes, I have teenagers so I can do this. So on one of the weekend days, either Saturday or Sunday morning, and that’s why I tend to go to Mass on Saturday night, is, I want to do a marathon sleep.

And you guys I can get in, 10 hours. I have been known to do 11. I haven’t been known to do 11, and it’s just like a challenge. I call myself a marathon sleep, but guess what? This weekend, I am driving the kids at 7:00 AM on Saturday morning to the bus for volleyball. 

Oh, I might be able to do it on Sunday, but if I had to drive the kids somewhere on Sunday, or we decided that would be the best time for math, then I wouldn’t be able to do my marathon sleep, and I know the Lord would take care of me on that. So that’s just an example, but I wouldn’t forget that. I do love to do that. 

Alright, so these are the things that I love doing, in a weekend, and you can take some ideas from me and you’ll probably come up with your own. And so I’ve put them at the top of a piece of paper and just a piece of paper with some check marks.

And then I try to schedule them in Thursday night, on when I’m gonna do them starting, you know, Friday or Saturday or Sunday. I schedule them in the weekends. Okay. So I like to go to mass on the weekends. 

I like to take a nap on Saturday and a nap on Sunday, which actually really isn’t true. Usually I don’t like to nap on Saturday ’cause I might go to confession or I prefer to just, like keep rocking through and being super productive on Saturday.

So if I don’t get the Saturday nap in, okay. But if I do, that’s super cool. I love doing. A marathon sleep. I have my Lent program that I wanna do. It’s the hours of the passion of Christ. It’s this book that I’m reading as my Lent thing. Okay? I like to plan my week, the family’s week. I like to discuss the weekend with my husband.

Now I put on here cook, like preparing, like food prep. You guys. I don’t love doing that. And I’m playing around right now because that feels too heavy to do on the weekends. It doesn’t feel restful, so I’m starting to do it Monday nights, which is kind of odd, but I like it. 

I just want to solve for that ’cause I can tell I don’t love doing it on Sunday and Saturday feels a little early, but what I will do is plan what I need to cook or food prep and I don’t have to, food prep. I don’t have to do that, but I do know it helps me. 

And so some of these things on this list aren’t like woo yippee. I get to do it, but I’m like, you know what? Come Monday, I am so happy I did that. So I’m just solving for that. Like how can that be a little easier? And one of the reasons I don’t love cooking on the weekends is ’cause my husband’s home on the weekends and the TV’s on.

But if I can cook Monday night. When he’s home, I just don’t like a lot of noise in tv. And it’s by the kitchen. So I found that cooking when he’s not watching TV is actually a lot more enjoyable. So I’m just trying to figure that out. One of my favorite ways to spend Sundays is like a couple hours in my bed with my notebooks and journaling.

I don’t get that every weekend. I get that like once a month, but I do love it. So I can just put that on this list. I like to ask the question. Which is, one of the things that I do when I’m pondering things in my bed is to look at my schedule. And I say, how can I support myself even more this week?

How can I support myself more? And that might be, you know what Sun has back-to-back volleyball games. We’re gonna need to come home and wash the uniforms. So maybe we could do the towels at the same time that you’re doing the uniforms. 

So when I say How can I support me, this weekend? It’s not in a selfish way. It’s in a way that’s like, how can I make life a little bit more simple? Where can I combine some things? And I don’t pressure myself to do this in a hard way, but just like what’s revealed, what seems like an obvious way? What’s one little thing I can do? 

One little thing that I’ve noticed is really helpful is to bring two waters when I’m working at my desk and coaching back to back, I’ll bring waters, or, oh, one thing I love is I love having an empty cup, and then I bring a bottle of club soda, like a whole, two pint club soda, and I bring an electrolyte drink, and then I just keep mixing it in my cup and it is like, so fun.

Anyway, Okay. Back to the weekends. I love doing a three to six mile run or walk. I’ve been training for a 10K. Well, I did that last year and I was  thinking I might do a half marathon this year, but I don’t know physically if I can do that. ’cause that’s coming up in the next couple weeks. 

Okay. I know I can’t do it. My husband’s like, you should just do the 10k, which is six miles. And I think I can do that even though I just smashed my toe. We’ll just see how that goes. But I like going out. I like getting outside and doing some sort of longer hour-long walk. It’s just so good for my brain. I just love it. 

It’s one of those things I wanna incorporate more into my daily life, and I’m so grateful that the weather’s changing and it’s staying lighter longer.

Okay. On Sunday, this has been something that I’ve really been able to do is adoration with no time limit. It’s one of the reasons I love going on Sundays because I don’t have to go anywhere. I don’t have to do anything usually. I mean, sometimes I have to go pick up kids from driver’s ed, but I love timeless time and adoration. It’s not limited by time. I can just sit there. I just love it.

And then I don’t do this all the time or that often, but I just added to this to discuss the week with my husband. I think that’s something that would be beneficial for our family. 

Okay, so those are the things. So Thursday I put, on my list. Thursday’s my Saturday. Remember that’s my day that I get to kind of like, this week I’m getting a massage, which never happens.

But sometimes what I’ll do is I’ll be like, oh, we get to go to. a walk today. I’ll get to, for sure, go to mass. I always go to adoration on Thursdays, or most of the time it might be the time that I tackle a special project. I wanna do this course. That sounds kind of fun. And if I do it on Thursday, it kind of feels like it’s no pressure.

Maybe, I wanna  deep clean a room with a podcast. It’s just kinda like, whatever, whatever. It’s like nothing that needs to get done, but it’s just so enjoyable and so fun. Maybe I’ll clean out, like my sock drawer or clean my closet. I don’t know. Just whatever feels like fun that day. 

Last week, I took the dog to the groomer and while I dropped him off, I went to adoration and then went to go visit a friend that I haven’t seen for a couple weeks and we had lunch, and then I picked up the dog from the groomer and then it was over.

So even though I say it’s a couple hours. And I did not plan the dog to go to the groomer on Thursday, but my husband asked me a few weeks prior to that if I would take him, and I said, yes, and I want to do that. I want to be that person for my husband. I wanted to do that. I didn’t forget Denise. You know.

So I want you to see that that doesn’t mean that I am not flexible, but I just make sure I check in with me and just love my reasons. And I believe that if we can go through and have an intentional weekend, one of the things that people say to me is that they eat outta boredom. 

Okay, so let’s start being intentional. What would you love to be doing? And we don’t think about it on Saturday ’cause you’re in it, but when you hear this podcast, you can start to be. thinking about what you want for your weekends.

Maybe one of the things you want to do is to go have a meal that you absolutely love out. Well, wouldn’t that be so exciting to know that that is going to be a meal that you’re having, that you typically wouldn’t have during the weekend? It’s going to be special.

It’s just one of the concepts. Having an intentional weekend that creates. The effect that you want. What do you want by the time you get to the end of Sunday? Do you wanna feel rejuvenated? Do you wanna feel in control? Do you wanna feel calm? Do you wanna feel taken care of and loved? Do you wanna feel like you had some fun?

Do you wanna feel like you were spontaneous? Maybe you know that Saturday afternoons are your spontaneous time. And that you work on house tasks or whatever from 9:00 AM to one, and then it’s fun spontaneous time, but maybe you plan that spontaneous. On Thursday night. You look and see, well, what’s available? What are some things that I’d wanna do this weekend? 

And maybe you plan three or four different options so that come Saturday afternoon, you’re like, oh, I don’t know what’s going on. You know, you’ve got these three to four different things.

So I hope this has given you some ideas on how you can have the weekends that you want, that you can plan as much or as little as you want, but that if you find weekends are tough, let’s start to identify what feels tough about them, what feels out of control and solve for it.

A couple weeks ago I did a restaurant game plan, so you can listen to that podcast and make sure that if you get invitations from friends or you have invitations to go to restaurants or maybe you want to extend an invitation, you can enjoy your meal out without regret. 

All right, everybody have a great weekend.