The best ways to keep on top of it all…
The Problem
When my daughter was born it became instantly clear that my ’seat of the pants, I can remember everything’ attitude had to change . I started to steadily come unstuck when I met the ever-growing freight train of ‘things to remember’.
Has the baby had her feed?
Am I giving the wife enough attention?
Where are the cats?
Do the rabbits need cleaning out?
Did I get fuel for the car ? …..aaarrrggghhh!
The Solution
I found two really good tips as a starting point. Firstly, was to get rid of as much unwanted tasks as possible. Secondly, to get rid of as much clutter as possible.
-I laid a patio, put in some evergreen shrubs, and barked over a large part of the garden, so as to reduce maintenance.
-I cleared the shed, bought a new mower, a new tool box and shelves, and labelled everything.
-I bought new cupboards fro my daughters room, and got everything away.
-I got rid of the old bike I had been planning to fix, the spare car parts from previous models, and old sports equipment.
-My wife and I got rid of any everyday clothes we hadn’t worn in twelve months (and replaced tatty ones we had).
And lastly we reduced our non-work activities to those we could do as a family. It actually helped us spend more time together planning trips for the next week.
I got a lot of help with these tasks from Dawna Walters book, The Life Laundry. It’s a great book, and it gives you great tips for clearing stuff you don’t need. It is very prescriptive, and if you have lots of storage space you wont get a huge amount out of it, but if you, like us, are rapidly running out of room, it’s a godsend.
The only problem is though, if you’re planning to have more kids, where do you keep all the gear until they arrive?
I’ll answer that one next time…
clutter, tidy, stroller, crib, car seat, fatherhood
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