Mobile Mommy

2009 is promising to be a fabulous year and like so many others I am taking today to post some of my plans for the coming months.

2008 was my first year as a work at home mom and it truly was a wonderful, wonderful year! I love being a virtual assistant and I feel more filled with hope for the possibilities this amazing career path offers than ever before. I had hoped for the past couple of years to make this dream a reality but thankfully when I had my wonderful baby Soy I was given the opportunity to seize the day so to speak and make it happen.

Now, with my business progressing I’m in a place to make so many plans for this year. I’ve already made business goals for 2009 over on my business blog, so this is where I’ll make plans for 2009 that focus more on my life. What is important to me, as a work at home mom, in 2009?

First - health. I am commiting to truly improving my health this year. I am going to hugely reduce the amount of sugar I consume and start getting more exercise. Typical goals of so many people in January, but I promise if you check back with me in June (in fact I think I’ll put into my calendar!!) I will be on track and feeling GREAT!!

I’m also going to work hard this year on one super important “mom” skill - my patience. I get far too easily frustrated when I feel pulled in all directions by my work, the kids needs, my husband’s needs, the housework, etc. I need to find that place inside of me that is capable of being calm and resourceful. Five minutes before reacting can save so much time in the long run - tickling instead of yelling, a hug instead of a “just give me a minute”.

My mama blog - well I feel like I truly discovered myself within this blog lately. Writing about being a work at home mom is just perfect for me and I plan to really invest some time into it this year. I’m also giving some thought to installing a really pretty new theme, but I have a couple other  financial goals first - including paying for my BlogHer registration after I receive payment for my invoices this month!

Finding my online tribe might seem like an odd goal, but it’s something I really care about. Business wise I’ve worked hard to become part of the legal blogger community and I’ve been relatively successful. I’m very involved on Twitter with other legal professionals and I was awarded a Clawbie for best new law blog of 2008 (so exciting!!!) Now it’s time to really start connecting with some other mom bloggers in a meaningful way, especially other moms who work at home or want to work at home. I have a great collection of Twitter pals, but I don’t spend nearly enough time on their blogs so I definitely want to do more of that this year! I also think meeting up with other bloggers at 2009 will contribute to meeting this goal. Meeting people in person can really change your interactions with them!

That’s enough for me to plan for now for 2009. I’d like to work super hard on each of these goals, I want it to be about quality, not quantity.  I can’t wait to see what the future holds!

Ok, I’ve told you mine - now you tell me yours! What are you doing to make 2009 a successful and exciting year?

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!

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!

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!

I know I talked recently about having a plan for working when your children are on break. I have to say though, that right now I’m really, really glad for the school break!! It is brutally cold here in the Edmonton region (temperatures in the -25 to -30 range pretty much the last week and well into this week). Yes that’s in celsius since I’m Canadian but I know I’ve done the conversions before and at this level the numbers in Fahreheit and Celsius aren’t that different.

So I don’t have to drag myself out to the bus stop twice a day in this weather - I can stay in where it is nice and warm and not feel bad about letting the kids watch a little bit of tv while I work. It truly isn’t outside activity time anyway! They do spend most of their day in free, very creative play though, not just watching tv, I promise!! They drive boats (aka the laundry baskets), build forts, put their babies (aka teddies) to bed and basically have a great time. Thank goodness for the ingenuity of young minds!

I do have to venture out to the library for a research project tomorrow. Plus some last minute grocery shopping before the holidays (what would a turkey be without stuffing after all - and I have no bread crumbs!!) But we’ll be fine - the crowds won’t be as bad in this weather - people really stay home when it is this cold, even those of us who are born and bred Albertans who like to believe we’re tough, we really don’t love this weather!

Take care!

I commented on this fascinating post by Janice over at 5 Minutes For Mom yesterday, but the topic was so interesting to me, and the comments so surprising, that I had to post about it on my own blog too!

When I read how little sleep some moms get by on I was truly shocked! Janice spoke of getting only a few hours a night and going to bed frequently between midnight and 1 am (or later). And Janice mentioned a person who gets even less sleep, Lori of A Cowboy’s Wife. Lori apparently thrives (judging by her awesome blogs and Twitter activity!) on less than four hours of sleep much of the time. Oh my goodness, I would literally lose my mind on that little sleep.

There were a couple of interesting trackback posts:

• Just Jenean’s post about her schedule;
• Upstate Mom posted about her schedule and sleep (she gets broken sleep like me!)

Also, several commentors noted that they sleep in the 6-7 hour range, which I guess is enough for some people, but not me!! I truly need at least 8 hours, and my optimum seems to be about 9 hours - unbroken hours! When, like in the first two years of each darling child, my sleep is broken I seem to be perpetually exhausted and frustrated. All my life I’ve been someone who needs a lot of sleep - it’s so awful that I have children who don’t sleep well as babies, lol! Soy is almost 13 months old, so I’m hoping in the next 6-12 months he’ll sleep 11-12 straight hours at night and I can start to feel human again. Keep your fingers crossed for me, would you?!

Are you ready for the holidays? I’m not talking about having presents bough, decorations up or the baking done. I’m talking about whether you are ready to keep on being a busy work at home mom while your children are on school break!

My son is happily counting down the days until his Christmas break and as of today there are only 2 days to go! It’s sure going to be busy in this house with him home! Fortunately for me I’m not that busy with work right now and, even better, my DH is off for a week of the holiday break as well. I should easily be able to stay on top of my workload!

It’s not always that easy though - especially if you are getting holiday guests, or are going to be out attending gatherings and parties a lot yourself. For that matter, I will have a couple of days where I will be awfully busy!

So what can a WAHM do who really needs to get some work done over the holiday period? Here are my suggestions:

• hire a teenager to come help out, even a couple of hours per day would probably be a BIG help!
• Plan a physical activity early in the day (skating, sledding, a long walk) and try to tire the kids out so they will relax and watch a movie while you work later on in the day
• stock up on craft supplies like playdough, paint, paper, etc; cold winter days are perfect for a full afternoon of crafts
• Make sure you have plenty of easy to grab snacks ready to go so you aren’t constantly getting up to make them something to eat
• New movies, books or video games are sure to please
• If all else fails - get up really early or stay up really late so you can do a little work when it’s quiet

And of course, remember, these are the times to enjoy your children! I know mine are growing up faster than I ever expected and even when I’m busy and tired and overwhelmed I have to remember that these are precious times and then I close the laptop and I go and play!