New Year’s Routine

This post is sponsored by Amazon Devices & Services.

I’m not usually big on resolutions in January (I find myself more motivated to make them in August when school starts), but perhaps because we are entering a new decade, I’m feeling inspired to set a few goals or at least set myself up for success in continuing good habits I established this past year. Resolutions are so much easier to keep if we have supports in place, a plan for how we’re going to maintain them and some accountability for our goals. In 2020, I’m relying on Alexa to help out with this support and accountability. We continue to “get to know” our Alexa devices more through utilizing the services and skills she’s equipped with, and setting up an Alexa Skill Blueprint is the latest way she’s helping out in our home.

What’s a skill blueprint, you ask? An Alexa Skill Blueprint is a way for you to customize your Alexa experience by programming personalized Alexa skills and responses that fit your unique lifestyle and schedule. Basically, you fill in a template with a list of possible options until your unique skill is created. For example, to help support my wellness and workout goals in 2020, I programmed customized workouts for different days of the week. All I have to say is “Alexa, start my workout” and she turns into my personal trainer, following the template I set up and leading me through my workout. Any of the Alexa devices in our home will offer me my workout, but I usually use our Echo Show.

I set up my workouts with the Personal Trainer Alexa Skill Blueprint and customized everything, from the sound of the start-up and end timer I want Alexa to use for each rep to fun phrases I want her to tell me throughout the workout to keep me going. At any time of the day, I can ask Alexa to start my workout, and she’ll lead me through it: “Ready for bicep curls? Let’s go for 60 seconds.”

You can customize different workouts for different days, track your progress through Alexa throughout the week and pause for rest when you need it.

Alexa Skill Blueprints can assist with a lot of other New Year’s goals as well. Want to organize a chore chart? You can create a Blueprint for that too, choosing different chore lists for different kids and different days. You can even set reminders for the kids and set times for the reminder alerts as well as which Alexa device you want to announce the reminder.

What’s really been fun is watching our Alexa devices get smarter and smarter as we program them with our unique routines and information, making our schedules run smoother. I’m excited to enter 2020 with momentum and a little push from Alexa to continue to meet personal goals.