Space for Living Organizing | San Diego, CA

Making Room for what Matters Most

“Making a List and Checking it Twice”

With only 4 days until Christmas it is important to stay organized so you can enjoy all of the magic of this season.  A great place to start is with a “Countdown to Christmas to-do list”!  Today’s 10-minute Tuesday will get those to-dos organized.  Believe me, taking 10 minutes to do this now will save you time in the long run!

 Set your timer for 10 minutes and try to find a quiet place.

1. Write down all of your last minute to-dos. Write down everything you can think of.
Estimated time – 3 minutes

2. Number your tasks in order of importance. What needs to get done first? I love to do this because it keeps me focused on one task instead of starting all my tasks at once and struggling to finish. I started with the top 5 tasks for the day and then I went back and prioritized the top tasks for Wednesday and Thursday.
Estimated time -2 minutes

3. Since you did a brain dump of all your to-do’s in step one, there may be some things that are on your list that just don’t need to get done this week. Is there anything that’s not time sensitive that you can postpone? Better yet, is there anything you can delete? Is there anything you can delegate to someone else in your family? I hope your list became a little short even if by only one or two things.
Estimated time- 1 minute

4. The next step is to go through and list the estimated time each item will take. This step helps you figure out when in your day you can tackle each to-do based on your schedule. Some of my time estimates may seem long but with two little ones in tow I have to be realistic! Some tasks might also require extra steps. For example, an item on my list is “get addresses”; but to do this I need to do a little digging on a memory stick that contains info from our old computer. It’ll take a little extra time to boot up the computer and sort through the files. Be sure to include this is in your time estimate.
Estimated time- 2 minutes

5. With your estimated time values in place, schedule in your tasks for the next 4 days. Often times we forget this step. But without taking a moment to give your tasks a home in your schedule, your to do list can feel overwhelming or you may not end up using it at all.

Estimated time- 2 minutes

Here’s a peek at my list-

And another task was recently added- Clean the balcony the girls decorated while I was wrapping gifts.  They were so proud!

So what are you last minute to-dos?  Is there anything you are going to cross off your list for this year?

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Thanks for the encouragement over on my post. It seems I'll work real hard but there's still the messy part. Baby steps.Writing things down is such a great idea! I have all these things running through my head and feeling overwhelmed. If I write it down, I can actually see what I need to get done and not feel so unprepared.