Today’s post is part of a blogging experiment asking people to figure out their plans to either increase time or increase income for 2011 and use 5 actions starting with the letter S to describe their plan of attack. Although I plan on doing a little bit of both (with another attic full of kid stuff to sell), I decided that what I would like most is to feel like I have more time this year. Last year was very hectic as I started a new sales job in May and my husband and I were both traveling for work often feeling like two passing ships in the night, meeting briefly to hand off the kids and keep on truckin.
My list of 5 things is going to be pretty tactical and specific to my lifestyle, so I don’t know how much wisdom can be had from this list, but I feel good about putting it out there anyway for my own sake.
Schedule Further in Advance
WORK – This is by far my biggest need for improvement with regards to work. I cover all of NY state but live in MA, so many of my customers are 4, 5 and 6 hours away. Earlier in the year I was just desperate to see as many customers as quickly as possible to get up to speed fast. This did not lead to the most efficient use of my driving time. A few years back I used a program called Map Point that mapped out all the people I wanted to see so that I could zoom in on an area and see who else is there. They offer a free 60 day trial that I’ll probably try again.
HOME – I used to be one of those people who had just about every weekend in the summer booked in advance but after kid #2 came along I sort of abandoned my philosophy of scheduling in fun. My kids were very young and sometimes it worked better to just go with the flow vs scheduling every waking moment with activities. I think I’d like to go back to scheduling 1-2 things a month to get more out of the year.
What’s helped me is when I research activities at my favorite local haunts. Then I put them on my calendar so that when I look to see what’s going on this weekend, I have some options already researched. I know there is a hot air balloon festival the second weekend in September, but I don’t always remember it come September and I am upset when I miss it. I also have annual things I want to do, go to the beach, go sledding or skiing, go to the zoo, etc. I used to have this rule that we had to use all of our sports gear at least once a year..that meant our scuba gear, biking stuff, climbing stuff, stained glass stuff. I’ve broken this rule for several years now and we’re slowly adding activities back in one at a time.
Self Reliance for the Children
My kids are now 2 and 5. I have several goals on this front.
- Get my older son to dress himself during school days. He dresses himself on the weekends, but during the week, it’s been more efficient to just dress him while he’s 1/2 asleep instead of debating with him about it. The first couple of days were ugly, but my anti mama’s boy self knows that the short term annoyance is worth the long term gain in self reliance.
- Potty train the 2 year old. I’m using the same approach as with #1. Big boys get birthday parties when they are 3. No birthday parties for babies in diapers. Oh, and my husband also told him that they don’t let diaper wearing kids have elephant rides at the zoo and he could get an elephant ride once he wasn’t in diapers anymore. You see the zookeeper doesn’t want the elephants pooped on so only big boys can ride them. Maybe this breaks some parenting rule book but it worked like a charm. I tried about 100 other things too but this approach was the winner, plus by the time they’re 3 most kids are beyond ready.
- Resist the urge to pick up their toys for them..make them do it 100% of the time.
Stocking Up
I hate shopping of any kind, but grocery shopping is a weekly requirement that sucks up hours every weekend. I also take Babci and it’s an excursion she looks forward to every week, so I’ve built it into my weekend as a multi hour event. I usually take my kids too so that my husband has some time to do his stuff. At times, it’s like herding cats.
Most of you don’t know this yet, but Babci is going to Poland for 2 months starting next week, so I can use that time to slash my weekend shopping trips. My approach until now has been to only stockpile enough food and paper products to last me until the next sale. I’ve gotten pretty good at it, but now I’m thinking I should stock up on 6 months worth of certain things so that I can limit my trips to Walmart. Plus, every shopping trip is an opportunity to spend money, so I should also theoretically save some money in the process.
Smart Multi-tasking
I’ve gotten away from reading books and I miss it. I also have stopped working out to the point that I’m having back problems again. I have a bike in the basement and I can spin on it while reading. I used to do this all the time and I’m getting back into it now. I realize this isn’t the best approach if I want to do interval training but my goal is to first start sweating on a regular basis and I’ll optimize it once I get into a routine.
Another example is to do my phone call errands when I’m driving and try to do more customer calls in the car. (I drive thousands of miles a month usually). It’s a little difficult because my dropped call rate and dead zones is horrific with AT+T in my area but I still think there is room for improvement.
Set Aside Time for Specific Activities
Ever since I started blogging, it’s provided a well needed escape and source for inspiration, but unless I can make a business out of it, I need to cut down on my surfing time. I remember in college when I discovered the internet back in the 90’s. I had to quit cold turkey or I would have flunked out of school. I think cold turkey is not the answer but I need to spend more time unplugged. I’ve caught myself where the whole family was either watching TV or on one of the computers and not interacting at all. I really don’t want to be that family. Ideally I want to keep my computer time to super early in the morning but that’s also when I like to ride my bike..oh this is going to be a hard one.
The other thing I used to do that I need to do again is splitting up the weekend. One day always used to be dedicated to fun, and the other to projects/errands. Some weekends have been all errands lately but the reverse is also horrible when you start the week with an empty fridge and mountain of laundry.
Lastly, vacations are still a priority and my favorite way to spend time as a family. They also tend to be some of the things adults remember fondly of their childhood. I have to start thinking about where we want to go. We are all going down to Florida in Feb but most of that time will be spent with me in meetings and I’ll only have 1.5 days with my kids. They’ll at least have time with their grandmother and dad. I want to do something in May..suggestions anyone?
Wow..I do have a lot to work on. I guess the head in the sand approach hasn’t been working too well for me. I’m looking forward to reading everyone else’s articles this week.
Here are the Other Coffee Talk Articles from Around the Web:
(be sure to check back at the end of the day as I’ll update this list as more posts go up throughout the day)
Invest It Wisely – New Year’s Blogging Resolutions
Molly on Money – Working 25 Hours a Week is Wonderfully Wicked
Budgeting in the Fun Stuff – New Year’s Resolutions brought to you by the letter S
Everyday Tips and Thoughts – New Year’s Resolutions the 5 S’s
Single Mom Rich Mom – The 5 S Resolutions
101 Centavos has The 5 S’s for the Spring Vegetable Garden (Babci would be proud)
365 Days on a Budget has Day 185 New Year’s Resolution Redux
Leave a Reply