5 Tips to Manage Your Time as a WAHM

5 Tips to Manage Your Time as a WAHM

I have a mask on my face, my hair is an absolute mess because I had to put my one and only brush in the freezer (lice! ugh. But if I am honest, I probably wouldn’t have brushed it today anyway). My shirt has a bit of puke on it (sick kid), and my cutoffs are unbuttoned because they no longer fit (I am blaming my husband for putting them in the dryer, but who knows…). I am sitting on the couch, watching “Spirit: Riding Free.”

#Glamorous, I know. But, I am here, writing this post.

Why am I telling you this? Well, because if you are reading this, you too probably feel like there is never enough time.

And I am here to tell you that, yep, you are right. There really is never enough time. Never enough time to get all the work done, never enough time to clean up the house, never enough time to finish the to-do list. And certainly never enough time to enjoy our kids the way we really wish we could. The undivided-attention, in-the-moment, full-of-love, peaceful sort of way.

There are always distractions.

So, what are we to do?

To be honest, I am not exactly sure. It feels like a constant battle. But here are a few things that I help manage time as a WAHM. I may not get my entire list done but certainly have helped me manage my time.

5 Tips to Manage Your Time as a WAHM

1. Prioritize

You’ve probably heard this before. I certainly have written about it before. But prioritizing is truly the best thing I can do each week to get the most important things done, feel at least somewhat accomplished, and give me the peace to be able to put things away at the end of the day (or when the kids wake up).

There is always too much to do. Sometimes, I look at my list and feel almost paralyzed as to where to start. When this happens, I know I haven’t spent enough time prioritizing.

Think about your life and where you want it to be at the end of the day, week, month, year. What do you need to do to get there? These are the priorities.

At the beginning of each week, I think of the most important things. The things with deadlines, the things that others are waiting on, the things that will grow us as a family, the things that bring joy to me and the kiddos, and the things that will grow my business.

I start my week by writing down all of the things I would like to get done that week. Then I go through the list and pick five things that are the most important. My toddler is in school three days a week for most of the day, so I schedule the top three things for those three days. The two days he is not in school, I schedule something fun as the number one priority.

Each day, I prioritize that one thing. And I work on that one thing first. I get the big kid off to school, settle the little one in for his first nap, and knock out the number one thing. Today, write a post is the number one thing. And, even though my big kiddo didn’t get to school today, I am writing. He is settled into a game and relaxing and I am using this time.

I will likely get NOTHING else done today. Except maybe laundry. Because well…sick kid.

Guess what? When I am done with this post, I will immediately feel accomplished. It motivates me to stay on track and get more done. And if I don’t get any more done, well, at least the number one thing is done.

Of course, there are always things like groceries, taxes, doctor’s appointments and such that won’t move the needle on your business, don’t bring joy, and but must get done. And, unfortunately, they have to be prioritized. So, I will put those at the top of the list if they are must dos (especially the appointments).

I try to reserve the number one spot for things that will make progress on my business and life goals or are something fun for me and the kids. But, sometimes the number one thing has to be something urgent but not important (deadline related). I also put the one thing I don’t want to get done, but know I have to here. And then I do it. This way it isn’t hanging over my head for days at a time as I worry about it.

Side note: I heard someone once say something like “Do we hate doing our taxes, or do we just hate thinking about doing our taxes?” I think there is a chance that the thinking about it and dreading it might be worse than the doing it. I don’t know. But either way, the longer it gets put off, the more time we spend dreading it. So, just getting it done makes sense. And if it is the thinking about it that we hate more, we might as well spend less time thinking about it and just get it done.

Each day, I also pick four more things to do. And I put them in order of importance, so that when I finish the first thing, I can move on to the second, third, etc. This way, when I am finished,

I rarely get through the third thing. But, when I do, I have already given myself guidance on what to do next.I don’t spend any time thinking about what I need to do next. It is scheduled ahead of time. It eliminates any downtime (other than scheduled and timed breaks). It also prevents stalling because I am overwhelmed with my list. I just do it. And I don’t have that feeling of overwhelm when looking at my list. It is at most five things long for each day. That is it.

I have a secondary list, my “master to-do list” that I put everything else on. It is divided into two categories: The things that will take less than five minutes, and everything else. If I have a few minutes between appointments, need a five minute break while I’m working on a big project, or am in the car waiting for something, I can get one or two of these little things done (and that also makes me feel accomplished).

I also use the Pomodoro method, and sometimes do these five minute tasks in the breaks (when I don’t use them to clean or mindlessly scroll).

2. Use your best and worst times to your advantage

All of us have a time of day when we are firing on all cylinders (or at least more of them than at other times). For me, it is right around 10 a.m. Most of us have a second time of day that we are also pretty amped up. We also have times when, no matter how much coffee we’ve guzzled and how well we slept the night before, we are still going to be foggy.

Use both of these times to your advantage.

It is a given that you should do the thing that requires the most brain-power during your best times. We know that (but are we doing it? Another story all together!)

But, how are you using your worst time?

This is the time of day that your mind is cloudy and you might forget your own middle name. How are you using this time? It is super easy to “work on a project” and then check your email for 30 minutes without replying to a single one. Don’t do this.

Take your worst time and do something mindless that still needs to get done. This is a great time for laundry and general cleaning. It is a good time to make a quick “errandy” phone call or fill out some easy paperwork. Run a quick no-brainer errand. Do the things that don’t require a lot of thinking during the times when you can’t do a lot of thinking.

Or use this time for you. Give yourself permission to call a friend or take a quick nap. Pluck your eyebrows or give yourself a facial. Play a game with your kiddos. Be silly. No matter what, try to use your worst time to your advantage.

3. Delegate

Here’s the deal. It isn’t going to all get done. It just is NOT. You know it. So, you have to figure out what must get done, but isn’t moving the needle on your goals. Can you delegate it? Usually the answer is yes.

I wrote a post on things that you should delegate and when to hire a while back. I also have talked about thinking about your time in terms of money and making hiring / convenience-based decisions that way. As women and moms, we think that we have to do it all or that if we do give it to someone else to do it might not get done right or as well.

We might be right. It might not get done exactly the way we would have done it or as well.

But that doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t let someone else do it.

You know what I am really good at? Cleaning. You know what doesn’t get done around my house? Cleaning. When someone else cleans it, I am usually disappointed. They don’t do as good of a job as I would have done.

That’s the key phrase though: would have done. Guess what? I don’t do it. At least not very often. So, my house is either dirty (disappointing) or clean but not as clean as I may have done it (disappointing, but at least I’m disappointed with a clean house).

My point is, sometimes hiring someone to do something that we can do well is hard. But, if it either won’t get done or is easier to have someone else do it, we should have someone else do it.

Other things to delegate: grocery shopping (have you ever grocery shopped with a toddler? Then you know why I love Shipt. And here’s $10 to try it.), graphic design if you’re not a designer, writing if you’re not a writer, web design if you’re not a web designer (I think you get it…). Maybe you need an assistant, maybe a babysitter, maybe a more helpful husband (I don’t think you can hire that out…).

Anyway, evaluate what you can hire out. And do it. Do not let your ego or your “I can do it better” get in the way. Free up some of your time to get moving on your priorities and the things that only you can do (like be your kids’ mom!).

I know as well as anyone how hard this is. Especially when money is tight. I also am so guilty of the “I can do it better than everyone” and then failing at it. You should see some of the “design” work I did early in my career. It usually looked like sh*t and took hours. Don’t do this. Hire and delegate.

4. Build the unexpected into your week

My kid got sick today. So, I had to snuggle him, assure him, love him, and take a long glorious nap with him. And now I have a lot of laundry. None of that was on my list for today. And none of it moves the needle on my goals. But the snuggling and loving are the most important thing I can do all week.

I know things like this will happen. So I make sure that at least one day of my week has “Catchup” as the number one thing. Usually it is Saturday. My husband is home, and if we don’t have anything big planned, I spend the morning catching up. If a kid gets sick, I move that day’s number one thing to the next day and just shift everything forward a day.

If you build in time for the unexpected, it isn’t as stressful as it could be. You already know that you will have time to catchup. And then, if you do get everything done (high fives all around, btw), you have a free chunk of time!

5. Lower your expectations

Maybe this should be number one.

We all have days when we get every single thing done. Those days are amazing. And for most of us, they are super rare (like once a year or so, rare for me). So, I know that I need to lower my expectations to adjust to the realities of working at home with kids.

I will never get as much done as I did pre-kids (although, hour for hour I am WAAAAYYY more productive. I can get as much done during a short flight as I did in half a day in my old life. And nap time! Just watch me cross things off my list!).

But most days are not as productive as I had hoped. Things happen, and we often feel disappointed in ourselves. Sometimes the “thing that happened” is just not being able to focus on work.

Lower your expectations of what you can and will get done. Once you have a more realistic idea of what you can do in a day, do your best. And if it doesn’t get done? Schedule it for later or let it go.

Lowering expectations will help reduce some of your stress, which in turn will free up mindspace to get stuff done. Remind yourself of your priorities (always), and then adjust your day or week.

At the end of the day, make sure to find time to congratulate yourself on getting more done with limited time and quiet than most people. You’re a WAHM, you’ve got this!

Ok, the post is done. Cross the number one thing off my list! I feel accomplished… Now on to that laundry. Ugh.

How do you manage your time as a WAHM? Any tips, apps, or anything special? I’d love to hear them as I’m always trying to be a little bit more productive in a little less time!