December 30th, 2008

Best Calendar or Diary System for a WAHM

Two days until 2009 and currently my to-do/calendar system is a little, well, interesting to say the least. Important deadlines are always put into my Google Calendar. I love the Google Calendar system, especially now that it is integrated into my Gmail! But I don’t really like to use it for all of my ongoing tasks and to-do’s. I prefer to keep it mostly for important deadlines and reminders so that when I glance at it I immediately see what is coming up, without having “pick up drycleaning” or “follow up on potential client” as part of the list.

Due to that desire, I’ve recently tried out a couple of online “to-do” style systems – Remember the Milk and Toodledo. Both are pretty good systems, but to be honest, I still kind of like having a physical list in front of me. I like that I don’t have to have my computer or cellphone handy to look at the lists!! I spend enough time on my computer as is, I like to prepare my daily to-dos without the computer – it’s a good thing to do first thing in the am, while the kiddos eat breakfast, without the full distraction that turning on my computer tends to be.

My current paper system is very inexpensive – but hardly the most organized! It’s a spiral bound notebook where each week I make a page with about 5 lines for each weekday and about 7 lines for the whole weekend. I then list the tasks I want to accomplish each day, personal and work stuff. I like being able to cross it out as I finish the task! Fortunately, my work is picking up and with another new client starting Jan 1, I don’t really have enough space to fit everything in properly (I write kind of big, lol) and I’d like a proper book where each week’s info is spread over two pages. I’ve looked at a lot of calendars, but nothing really appealed to me enough to spend the money on it. At least my system is about $3 and lasts quite a while!

Still, I definitely want to upgrade to a real calendar, and definitely a paper one. I may try harder with an online system too, but for now I’m on the hunt for a great diary suitable to my wahm lifestyle! Here are a few I’ve found online so far:

• Moleskins – seem to be a huge fave of a lot of people. I don’t want the whole week on one side with notes on the other though. I want a full column for each weekday and that doesn’t seem to be an option here.
• Mom Agenda planners – hmmm, these may just be what I need. A little pricey (to me anyway!) but if it keeps me organized….
• This also has a great format – a free printable planner from Busy Mom Resources. I’d have to print it and put it into a binder (and label it all), but I do have a great binder I could use for it. Definitely a more frugal solution!

Decisions, decisions! Anyone have any other suggestions or resources? Love to hear from you!

December 30th, 2008

Twitter and “Real Life”

I introduced a “real life” friend to Twitter today. I have to say it was funny to watch her face as I tried very hard to demonstrate tweeting, explain about following, and have her look at my profile and updates with me. She couldn’t imagine how I can follow over 600 and some people (and that’s just on my business account – with some small overlap I also follow 700+ on my mobilemommy account!!) I had been telling her about how successful Twitter is for me for networking though, so I wanted her to see it in action. She’s thinking about starting her own home-based freelance writing business, and I think she can see the potential, even if it looked a little overwhelming!

Twitter has been a big topic for me this past couple of weeks, even though my poor mom Twitter acccount has been semi-neglected over the holidays. In fact I just posted about finding a virtual assistant on Twitter over on my business blog!

It’s been so busy and fun with the kids on break and my hubby also off of work until early January, that I’m having to put all my computer time into my regular work, with much less time for Twitter and my blog! Things should calm down again next week (maybe, lol – I have a new client as of Jan 1 so who really knows!) and I am definitely doing some year-end thinking/reviewing/planning that I want to blog about soon. I’ll be watching for all you other wahm’s to share your plans for 2009 too – until then, take care!

December 26th, 2008

Time to Rev Back Up

Well the holidays are flying by and now that Christmas is over I find myself completely invigorated and refreshed and ready to plan for 2009. I’ll have a detailed post soon sharing some of my goals and thoughts about being a work at home mom over the coming year, but right now I just had to say how great it was to take a little break!

I have been working a little over the past few days and I signed a really exciting new client which should push my monthly income into a much more comfortable place! This is a big milestone, since I’ll now be making very similar to what I did as a full-time, in house legal assistant, well at least what I took home after paying daycare, parking, union dues and such. Not even considering the cost of professional work clothes, birthday lunches, co-worker gifts etc! So I’m feeling very proud of my fledgling VA business and really, really excited about the coming year and all the possibilities that are unfolding.

Hope you all had a wonderful holiday and are making your plans for the new year!