Late Night = Mommy time

Like so many other moms out there, I find myself finishing my daily to-do list late at night.  I just can’t seem to finish everything I set out to accomplish for the day.  Good thing that it’s 11:35pm and I still have 25minutes left of the ‘same’ day.

Why do we do this to ourselves? Experts in time management always suggest doing daily to-do lists. But why? Do they not know how many things moms have in their list?  Apparently those experts must not be “moms” themselves; otherwise, they would warn us against making them too long, too detailed, or too time consuming.  Today’s list was LONG and it only got LONGER.

I googled “How to make a good to do list” and not only did suggestions for apps, programs, widgets, and all kinds of things that are beyond my tech knowledge.  I did, however, stumble upon a web blog that caught my eye: Dumblittleman.com.  Why would I take advice from someone who calls herself dumb? Curiosity-Here-I-come.

Dumblittleman suggests the following:

1. Make sure that the tasks you enter (in your t-d-l) are  single ones, ideally taking no more than an hour each. Seriously? I almost fell off the chaise! I have never met a mom who could dedicate one hour to a single task without interruptions.  1hr is how long it takes a mom to build a monument!  A task is 5-8min… thank-you-very-much!
2. Don’t try to go into too much detail. If a task takes less than 15-20 minutes, it shouldn’t be on your list. Point #2 that his person isn’t a mom.  Has she heard of motherhood-induced-ADD?  It’s the little things I can’t remember… and they are usually important.  For example: Take carpool tag from husband’s car so I can pick up kids. Yes, I write this down too. Why? Because I am usually half way to school when I realize I forgot it at home (like today).
3. Do you prefer a paper or electronic to do list? Can you really expect me to believe that I can get the same feeling of satisfaction when I click “done” on the electronic version than I get when I manually cross it out? Heck NO. It’s called “pen therapy.”
4. Should you assign priorities to your tasks? If by priorities she means: GET IT DONE BEFORE KIDS GET BACK, then yes.  Otherwise… just write that stuff down!
5. Do you use a closed or open to do list? If my list had three things written on it I think it would classify as a closed list.  But the REASON we write a list in the first place is because it has MORE than 3 things in it, right?

I searched further on Google and Bing and again came up with nothing useful. Whaaaatt???  I am realizing that my to do lists are mine. They are my way of staying on track of what my goals for the day may be; no matter how big or how small a task.  Did I write “take carpool” sign? Nope.  Did I forget? absolutely.  My brain is constantly racing and working on what’s coming up next.  I feel the need to cross things off my list that is written on a piece of paper.

Tomorrow is another day… with another list.