You’ve carved out a great home office space for yourself and you’re typing away at your new blog post or a contract or other work, everything going great. But then the kids come in the room and chaso erupts. It’s loud, distracting and nearly impossible to think straight, much less have a phone conversation with a client. It’s not the ideal way to work, but we’ve all been there. And when kids, husbands and possibly other family members are home for the holidays, it becomes even more crazy and way less productive.

We moms are always worrying about what needs to be done and how we can accomplish even more, whether it’s doing “real” work, housework or shuttling the kids around. Moms are constantly on the go not only physically but mentally as well. If you are looking to get more things accomplished, here are some tips that you can try in your own household to keep everything running smoothly and keep getting those tasks accomplished without delay.

1. Establish a routine. With everything that goes on in the house, plus a lot on Mom’s mind, it may be difficult to establish a routine. Honestly though, creating a habits during the day is usually very helpful within a household. If you have older kids, make them part of it. Write down your routine and make it visible to everyone to make sure that everybody does what he or she is supposed to. Establish a standard operating procedure on how things should go around the house. For example, write down things the kids should do before they go to school, when they get home from school and responsibilities around the house that they need to get done on a daily basis. This will not only give them some responsibility so that they learn to be independent but ultimately it will also help you with the chores and getting things done.
2. Your husband should also play an active role when it comes to doing certain tasks, chores and errands. The entire family should pitch in with things around the house, not just mom.  Let the family sit down and talk about the tasks that they can do and decide on an equal sharing of chores and responsibilities among one another. And implement some general clean up rules, like 15 minutes before dinner time or bed time, so that things get put away on a regular basis.
3. Take it one day at a time. Plot the kids’ activities for the day and work around it. Plan to do less and not more than what you could possibly handle. Sometimes, we tend to put gazillion things on our to-do lists because want to get so much accomplished. But this will only get you confused as to where to start and you may end up just staring at your list and doing unnecessary stuff instead. When your list contains fewer tasks, you can take it one at a time and by the end of the day, you’ll probably wind up noticing that you were able to accomplish more than usual.
4. Be realistic about how much time you have in your hands. This goes hand-in-hand with the number of tasks that you put on your list. You can’t do everything all at once and you only have so many hours in a day (especially when you have kids running around the house and screaming.) Do not cramp everything in a day. Organize and prioritize tasks so that the ones that need to be done immediately can be completed and the rest can be distributed within the week.
5. Work smarter not harder.If you drop your kids off somewhere but know you need some quiet working time while they’re gone, but you live or work across town, see if you can find a place to get your work done nearby. If you need an internet connection, there are tons of places available to do this across the globe. So it’s just a matter of being prepared and thinking ahead so you can get the work done that you need to within that time frame.
   

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6. Learn to say no. Having kids at home can fill up your day, which means that you may have less time to do other things. You have to learn to decline other things like doing favors for friends. Sometimes, you give too much importance about what others will think of you if you do not lend them a hand but the truth is, even when you do say yes, you may not be able to do the task efficiently because it’s too much for you to handle along with all the other things. So if you can’t do it, you should just learn to say no in the most polite manner.
7. One other thing to help you get more things done is to plan ahead of time. Last minute planning usually requires more work and may ruin all the other plans that you already have lined up. Incorporate the kids’ schedules with yours so you it doesn’t cause conflict. Use Google Calendar or other scheduling apps to help you keep track of everything and make sure no schedules are overlapping.
8. Take advantage of the time when kids are preoccupied. When they are playing by themselves, sit yourself in front of the computer or work on the projects or cleaning tasks you’ve been putting off. When they are napping, you should also be able to get quite a bit done. It is only a matter of time management.
9. Get one task done before moving on to the next. Shifting from one task to the other without getting the previous one done would only slow down your productivity. Start a task and finish it before moving on to the next. I think that many of us multi-taskers suffer from this problem of trying to switch between multiple things at once. But if you just work through each thing on its own, without checking your email 6 times or jumping up to do something else, you’ll find you get the first task done much more quickly.
10. Schedule your tasks and do them at the time you have assigned. Commit to the task at hand so you finish on time and you can move on to the next. This way, when you have plotted out some time to spend playing with the kids, you won’t have to sacrifice it for something else.
11. Give the kids attention when they get really wild. If you notice your kids are hanging on your and getting crazier than usual, it’s time to take a break and pay some attention to them. This is especially true with little kids. Oftentimes, just 15 minutes of your undivided attention is enough to satisfy them for a few hours and you’ll be able to get in some good working/cleaning/etc time afterwards.
12. As you settle for the day, make sure to keep everything ready for the next full day ahead. Preparation is always key. Be prepared to take on another day of tasks, chores, errands and not forgetting the kids.