Meal Planning Card System

I found a wonderful meal planning card system on the Nurture Mama blog. I knew Kristi before I knew she had an amazing blog geared towards moms with young children. She really practices what she preaches and has a wonderfully organized AND happy family. I used to do meal planning using a variation of this system when my children were young. Since feeding children is a daily occurence (!), moms (or dads) will save time and energy over the long run by taking a little bit of time now to make a system that can be used over and over again in the future.

I always tell my clients and students everything in your life needs a 'home' so that it will be easy to find and use. Kristi uses this idea with her menu cards, taking recipes from several locations, putting favorites into 1 location (or 'home') and then using those to plan her grocery shopping for the week. She has great photos showing what the cards look like and many favorite recipes too.

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A Simple Time Management Formula

A simple time management formula might help you keep your calendar more manageable. Make a quota of how many opportunities you can reasonably get involved with, for example volunteering. Keep in mind your stamina, other 'must do's' in life and so forth. I once heard someone say her friend set her quota at 3. Once she had said yes to those 3 assignments, she would say 'no' to any new requests, until 1 of the original 3 was completed. If she completed 1, she could then say 'yes' to 1 new opportunity, thus always keeping her quota at 3 volunteer or optional assignments.

Thus she could volunteer with 1 community organization, 1 church position and 1 professional volunteer assignment because she felt that was reasonable for her lifestyle . For example, she could volunteer 1x/month in her child's elementary school class, help in her church's Sunday School and be on 1 ad hoc committee at work. If she was approached by a 4th or 5th request from others, she could say 'no' guilt-free, knowing she had reached her personal quota regarding how much free time she had available to volunteer.

Choosing a realistic formula for your life is worth the few minutes it takes to figure it out. The benefits are a feeling of being in control of your calendar plus having the time & energy to do a quality job in those areas you do chose to say 'yes' to.

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Feel like you're running as fast as you can but going nowhere?

If you feel like this 'hamster', running all day long but going nowhere, you might need to learn how to prioritize your time better. If you have a watch that can have an hourly chime set on it, use it to help you stop and think every hour "What is THE absolutely most important thing I need to do over the next hour?" Then go DO that 1 thing.

If you do this simple exercise on a regular basis, it will help you begin to learn how to spend your time working on your top priority items, so that at the end of the day you will feel like you actually DID go somewhere (& got those important 'to do's' accomplished along the way.)

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