Product reviews, parenting articles, and advice for first-time moms from the experiences of real-life mommies.

This post is from my sister – the proud mommy of a 9-month old baby boy! (Who’s one of the cutest boys around, by the way!

A little background on me: I am a new stay-at-home mom to my awesome baby boy, Andrew. I am also a bit of an organizational freak (it runs in the family) . I am one of those people that needs lists and structure and order to my world in order for anything to actually get accomplished. As I know a lot of new moms do, I have really struggled to not only care for my baby (and my husband) but to also actually get something else done with my life. I had dreams of all the projects I would do around the house once I stopped working and stayed at home with my new baby. And dreams they have remained….

About 4 or 5 months ago I decided I needed some sort of weekly schedule set up as well as a running list of “to do’s” so I reverted back to my old administrative days and created a spreadsheet–all pretty and color coded and organized. Basically, I had it set up so that the far left side was my “to do” list in order of priority and then next to it was a Monday through Friday schedule set up–Mondays were laundry, Tuesdays were groceries, Wednesdays were cleaning, and so on. This system could very well work for some of you out there, but I couldn’t seem to get into it. It wasn’t flexible enough for me or for the uncertainties of babyhood. Sometimes I never got to laundry on Monday, or I was having a meeting at my house that night so I needed to clean instead. And as far as my “to do” list, it seemed nothing ever got done off of that because there was always something coming up. (To be fair, I need lists right in front of my face screaming at me that I can also cross off and erase.)

So, I needed a better system…one that allowed me to be flexible from week to week and day to day, and also allowed me to write things out “on paper”.

Enter the Dry Erase/Magnetic Calendar! I bought it, along with a regular dry erase board (for my project/”to do” list) and some kids’ magnetic letters and numbers at Walmart , total cost being around $15.00. Hey, I need to have fun while I work!

Basically every week I sit down in front of my calendar and project list, knowing the appointments and other extras going on that week and schedule accordingly. So that I am not writing everything out and cramming lots of info onto one little daily block, I use a magnetic letter to represent each of my regular “duties” (G for Groceries, L for Laundry, H for Housework, P for week and meal Planning, etc.). Then in the bottom left corner I write the number(s) associated with the projects on the “to do” list that I hope to accomplish that day.

The project list is on a board of its’ own, with magnetic numbers labeling them. I did it this way so that if for some reason the project prioritized as #1 is no longer as important as #4, they are easily switched. That way I don’t have to completely re-write my list. Every week looks different than the one before and projects/”to do’s” that don’t get done can easily move to the next week!

I just started using this system 3 weeks ago, and I already feel better about the way I spend my time. I really do feel like I have accomplished more simply by having a structure in place that still allows for the baby bumps in the road. It’s also nice because my husband can see everything that’s going on that week for me and can easily add something to my list that he’s asked me to do as well. I am sure there might be tweaks to this system that might make it even better, or better suited for you, so please feel free to comment and give your own suggestions!