I am what I like to call the mom-planner. I am the mom who thrives on order, schedules, systems, and control. Maye a little control—alright, a lot of control! I like to know what is happening in my day. I like to plan and look ahead to see what my day is going to be like.
Recently, I had to come to grips with the fact that my house is entirely full right now. There are ten of us in our home right now on family lockdown during this pandemic. Any moment it feels like the house is going to explode into a chaotic mess between the cooking, cleaning, laundry, and so much more.
Then there is the never-ending to-do list I have. You have one of those too, right? I know I’m not the only one with a list like this, moms. How do we get it all done? How do we manage to squeeze it into everything else?
10-Minute Project
A while ago I discovered something, I like to call the 10-minute project. I figured out that I could squeeze in just 10-minute projects throughout my day when I had those random of 10 minutes during my day where I was waiting for something else to finish. Sometimes I was waiting 10 minutes for the laundry to finish or dinner to come out of the oven.
Even before our family lockdown, I found myself waiting around 10 minutes before the kids came out of school. When I was busy during the day, I still had a spare 10 minutes where I was waiting on something else.
If you are someone who has a busy schedule, you can always put these 10-minute projects into your day. Maybe its before you go to bed or right after you put the kids to bed. You take 10 minutes to start checking off your to-do-list.
Be Organized
If you want to check off your to-do list in 10 minutes you need to be organized. You have to be proactive with your time when you get those spare 10 minutes throughout your day.
Here is how you can get started:
- Set aside some time and look at your to-do list.
- Write it out if you don’t have it written out. Write everything on your to-do list that you want to get done, the things you need to get done, and dream about getting done.
- Get a second piece of paper and look at all the things on there that you know you can do in 10 minutes or less.
- Once you have your list, keep it in a place that’s convenient and easy for you to look at referring to when you have that free time.
Use Your Timer
Do you have a bigger project that’s more than 10 minutes? You can break it down into 10-minute tasks.
Use a timer and set it for 10 minutes and work on the bigger project. When the timer goes off quit what you are doing and go back to what else you need to get done for the day. Then go back to the bigger project when you have another 10 minutes, whether it is later that day or the next day.
Here’s How to Get Started
To help you get started, I came up with 26 different tasks you can complete within 10 minutes or less.