Managing my Time

I am preparing a time management seminar that I will be conducting later this month for a group of employees at the college where I teach. While I am not necessarily a time management expert, I do think that I do a pretty good job of managing my time.

Except when it comes to some typical mom duties. Sometimes in my desparate attempt to be the good mom I think I should be, I waste a lot of time on things that aren't important. Take my soon to be 4 year old's upcoming birthday party. It is an important event, but I've found myself spending way too much time worrying about it.

For some reason my duaghter has decided that she wants to have a 'rock-n-roll' themed party. I'm not sure she knows what 'rock-n-roll' is, but I suspect her interest is related to a Hannah Montana birthday party she attended for an older friend a few months ago.

And so my search for 'rock-n-roll' party invitations and decorations has consumed much of my past week. I failed to plan far enough ahead to use the Internet to find the perfect invitation (unless I wanted to spend $30 for expedited shipping!). Instead, I spent hours searching local party supply and card stores for the perfect invites. Which of course I did not find. A few more hours searching online for graphics that allowed me to create my own cards finally solved my dilemma.

But instead of feeling joy in finally getting the invitations in the mail, I wondered, what is wrong with me? I mean I've lost many precious hours searching for these invitations, when she will probably forget by the party that she wanted the 'rock-n-roll' theme anyway. Further, she can't read! I could have found invitations that said 'come to my knitting party' and she would have been happy.

I know I am not the only mom that has this problem. My friend Sandi confessed to staying up until 2am the night before our kids' "Safety Town" graduation to make homemade cookies shaped like traffic lights for the graduation celebration. I teased her some, telling her she was making the rest of us look bad. She agreed, and suggested that perhaps she tries to overcompensate for time missed with her kids due to work.

Whatever the reason, I am sure to waste time again in the future on some mom responsibility that I just am not good at. But at least taking the time to make the effort makes me feel like I am doing my best. And there are certainly worse things I could spend my time doing.