Have you ever wished you could stop a busy, organized mom for just a few minutes and ask her how she does it? Well, that’s exactly what we’ve done with Chantol Sego in this fun, idea-packed episode of Power of Moms Radio.
Chantol is the mother of two children who juggles a LOT of responsibilities, including a full-time job, volunteer positions, and extracurricular activities. She’ll share how she has applied Mind Organization for Moms to her life, which digital tools are her favorites, and how she keeps life balanced so she can enjoy her time with her children!
Show Notes:
Mind Organization for Moms – Get your beautiful life all buttoned up!
Chantol’s Wedding Planner Site: Something New
Chantol’s Posts Here at Power of Moms
Chantol’s Bio: I’m married to my high school sweetheart and we have two daughters, ages 12 and 15. I work full time in the finance industry and co-own a wedding planning business, Something New, with one of my best friends. I love to watch my girls play soccer, play music, and follow their dreams. I also love to organize, plan, read, write, edit and volunteer for Power of Moms.
Music from Creations by Michael R. Hicks
Audio editing by Emily Peterson
Feature image from Shutterstock, graphics added by Anna Jenkins
Thank you so much for this podcast! I found it very helpful. A couple of further questions that I would love to hear feedback on:
1) Toodledo vs. Evernote as a task management system: Any and all opinions on the pros and cons of each would be greatly appreciated!
2) April mentioned in the podcast that her family has a chore system that has been in place for two years now. Please share!!
Angie-
Thanks for listening!
1) I use ToodleDo exclusively as I have for years and it is very versitale with being about to track task by context and due date as well as by project and level of importance. There is also a section to keep notes and I use that for reference lists, sports schedules, medical history that I might need handy, etc.
I haven’t used Evernote, so I don’t have comparison, but I have heard that many people love it.
2) I can’t wait to hear about April’s chore system as well!
– Chantol
Working on a post soon with our chore chart. It’s really so simple–essentially we divide up some jobs for a whole year and others for just the month. The kids helped decide which jobs felt right. 🙂 More soon!
What was the grocery shopping app you mentioned? Thank you!
The app is called Our Groceries. We’re excited to soon link in our teenager on this as well as she is excited to drive soon and be able to stop and pick up things on her way home. (Hoping that excitement lasts once she actually does start driving.) 🙂
Hi Chantol,
Can you explain (or show screenshots even! :)) how you have your projects in Toodledo vs. next immediate actions? Do you have a separate place where you list out your current projects and then have the next immediate actions for those projects? I can see how the immediate actions and routines can be managed well in Toodledo, but I’m just trying to figure out how you have your bigger projects listed and if you manage those in that app also.
Thanks for sharing! I’ve been trying to figure out how to digitally manage my projects and tasks for a while. I’ve been using Trello, but I feel like Toodledo may be a better fit if I can figure out how to make all these different pieces work together! 🙂
Hi Jessica. Thanks for listening!
I set up major projects as a folder. For example, we are planning our upcoming vacation….so I have a folder called Vacation. Each time you add a task or next action, you can assign it to the appropriate folder. Then when you view all of your immediate next actions, you can see them by context (computer, home, errands, work, etc) or you can see them by folder and look at just those tasks for a specific project. This has worked well to keep projects separate when needed, but also makes it easy to see all of my tasks that need to be done each day no matter project they are for.
Hope that helps. If you need more clarification, please let me know. 🙂
Thanks Chantol! That’s helpful. I figured out the Folders = Projects and found the Contexts and set those up as Home, Phone Calls, Errands, etc. How do mark the next immediate action for a project? Do you use the stars or just the priorities? I’m starting to put a bunch of tasks in, but I need to make sure I just see the next actions otherwise it’s going to get overwhelming!
Also, what about things like “Someday” projects or things you’re waiting on from someone else? Do you have a way to manage that in the app?
I’m liking it a lot so far and think it can really do a lot – way more than anything I’ve ever seen before as far as managing the systems in the M.O.M program. So thank you for sharing your insight!
I’m so glad you’re liking it.
There is a Status field that let’s you label each task as “Next Action”, “Waiting”, “Hold”, “Someday” and other status levels. This should help you sort your tasks to see just what you need.
For Someday type items, I actually have a few Contexts set up as I add a lot to these…
“Someday/Maybe”, “Read”, and “Reference”.
It is definitely my favorite program to use.
Oh my goodness! There are so many different fields in this program that are just so perfectly set up for the GTD/MOM program. It’s amazing! Thanks for pointing out the Status field. I didn’t have that one visible, so I didn’t know it was there! I’m so excited to get everything set up in here. I really needed a reboot of my system, so thank you for sharing what you do! It’s been very helpful!
I found the comments so helpful, like a full-on tutorial for Toodledo. Thx! So excited to check it out and get started organizing our life? (it’s been a LONG time coming!)
Laura,
It is definitely a wonderful program. I hope you find it as useful as I have!
This information was great! I’d love something similar with a mom of younger kids, too (at least one non-school age kid). Personally, I have a little bit of a hard time with these systems at the moment because my kids need me to do so much for them still…. Goals and plans get derailed easily. And I still dream of a full night’s sleep. Accomplishing things feels good, but I have to be very careful not to over do it, then it starts to feel depressing.