How To Keep Juggling Without Dropping A Ball: Tips and Tricks from a Working Mom

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With having two kids, working full time, and just generally living life, I always feel like I am just on the verge of dropping one of the proverbial balls in the air.  That said, after several years of juggling, I do feel like I have managed to come up with a few tips for maintaining some level of sanity.  That level may be low (especially if you ask my husband), but it is a level nonetheless.
  • “Stick It On The Calendar” – My husband and I both use Microsoft Outlook at work, and we learned pretty quickly after M was born to take advantage of the Calendar feature for our personal obligations in addition to our work obligations.  I refuse to believe it is age, but my memory is just not what it used to be, and trying to remember each others’ late evening work obligations, doctors’ appointments, and other personal commitments is like watching sands run through a sieve.  Instead, we literally send each other calendar invites for everything, and this way we know what is expected of the other each week/weekend as well as whether we need to, for example, ask our sitter to stay late one night.  Thus, in response to pretty much every conversation about our schedules, we simply respond with what has now become our mantra: “Stick it on the calendar.”  (PS: If you don’t have Outlook, there are plenty of other shared calendar options out there – iCalendar, Google Calendar – are just a few).
  • Smart “To-Do” Lists – I am a compulsive list maker, partially because I can’t remember anything (see above) and partially because there is nothing as satisfactory as crossing something off of my never-ending to-do lists.  Several years ago I read David Allen’s “Getting Things Done” and two key takeaways resonated with me.  First, list only actionable tasks rather than large, vague projects (read: hard to motivate to actually get done).  For example, rather than list “organize office,” which is a project that you likely will never complete when you think of it like that, break it down into smaller, actionable tasks such as “create labels for folders”, “pay electricity bill”, “alphabetize receipts”, etc.  Second, complete first any tasks that can be done in two minutes or less.  The theory is essentially the law of diminishing returns – the longer it remains on your to-do list the longer you have spent organizing it into your life than the time it takes to actually just complete the task.20131220-IMG_1916
  • Christmas in July … or Whenever – I LOVE the holidays and I LOVE giving gifts. You know what I DON’T love?  Trying to cram holiday shopping in during an already super busy time of year and ending up buying something just to buy something and knowing that it isn’t thoughtful or personal.  Instead, a few years ago I started just buying things (or at a minimum making a note of it) as I see them and keeping them in an area of a large, linen closet and making a note of it on a “Gift List” that I maintain in Evernote.  The downside:  I don’t always get to take advantage of those Black Friday Deals.  The upside:  The holidays mean a lot more to me than a $10 TV purchased at Wal-Mart that I had to trample over someone to purchase.
  • Fully Stocked Freezer and Pantry – I admire and seriously would love to be one of those people that organizes and plans their weekly meals.  Maybe it is because on Sunday something seems like a completely reasonable meal for the upcoming Wednesday, but on Wednesday sounds like the last thing I (much less my family) want to eat.  Instead, as I wrote in an earlier post, I aim to have the freezer well stocked with a selection of homemade freezer meals and to have both the freezer and pantry stocked with some go-to prepared foods (think brown rice, quinoa, veggie burgers, organic burritos, etc.).
  • Strategically Multi-Task – To multitask or not, that is the question these days.  I am fairly certain that some recent efforts on my part have been secretly observed and used in support of the many articles of late that conclude it is actually less productive to multitask than not.  For example, M now likes to recite the time that mommy caught the spaghetti on fire and for Z’s first birthday, I completely left out an entire cup of butter, which resulted in edible but sticky cupcakes … all because I was trying to do too many things at once.  The moral of the story, be strategic in your multitasking.  For example, folding laundry while watching re-runs of House Hunters is probably not going to result in mis-matched socks but other tasks, like cooking (apparently), are probably best done with your full attention.
What tips or tricks do you have to keep your sanity, get everything done, or, you know, prevent flaming spaghetti noodles? 
Edible (and I thought pretty), but sticky cupcakes.
Edible, but very sticky, cupcakes.
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Kara
Kara, her husband, and two little girls M and Z live in the idyllic town of Rowayton. She was born and raised in West Virginia and, although she has lived in the New York metro area for over fifteen years, is a mountaineer forever (Go ‘Eers!). In addition to being a mom to M (born in 2011) and Z (born in 2013), Kara is a full time attorney working in Manhattan and a hobbyist photographer. When not battling Metro North, she enjoys practicing her photography skills, reading the latest best-sellers, trying new recipes for the girls, getting outdoors whether running, hiking or snowshoeing, and competing with her husband for the self-proclaimed title of “Efficiency Expert.” If you can’t find her doing any of these things, she most likely has fallen asleep on the sofa while attempting to watch the latest “must see” movie.

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