Mojo Mom Podcast with Neat Freak Professional Organizer Perri Kersh

The Mojo Mom Podcast welcomes friend-of-the-show expert guest Perri Kersh to share her her professional organizing tips that are especially useful during this month of Back to School transition.

Here's the podcast:

It's time for fall cleaning. Amy and this week's co-host Patty Ayers talk about letting go of clutter, as Patty has done in a major way by moving to Mexico and embracing a life rich in experiences that is not weighed down by possessions.

Then Mojo Mom turns to "Neat Freak" professional organizer Perri Kersh for her tips for creating a landing pad for your family's belongings. As school gets into full swing it's a good time of year to look at the flow of informaiton and "stuff" into your household, and the small step of creating a landing pad can help with that process.

Listen to the podcast now:

Back to school blast-off!

It's Back to School day for my family, and I think we are all breathing a sigh of relief, including Mojo Girl. She is so active that she missed the daily interaction with lots of friends in her classroom.

I feel a renewed sense of appreciation for having six hours of work time that allows me some breadth and depth of effort, not just a total rush that requires me to squeeze things in two and a half hours of summer camp. In fact, it reminds me a lot of how I felt when my daughter first went off to preschool and I had about two hours to write, which felt like an incredible luxury compared to the mere minutes I'd have to steal before then.

I have the luxury of working around a variable childcare schedule. I feel for those parents who have to find a way to work 9 to 5 all summer long. In nearby Wake County, the school system is tweaking their weekly schedule to have kids get out an hour earlier on Wednesdays, and staying 10 minutes later on the other four days. What a nightmare for many parents to find a way to cover that one hour, once a week. It's an unwieldy gap: too long to leave unaddressed, but too short to really merit a new childcare solution.

This schedule change was done to give teachers an extra hour of planning time each week, but I think that the practical impact on families should be given much more consideration when these kinds of changes are made.

I'd be interested in reading your comments about other scheduling situations that might seem like a small adjustment, but create a big inconvenience for parents.

And speaking of schedules, *ding* my work time is just about up for today. On my way out the door I'll recommend Lisa Belkin's latest Motherlode Blog post on the NY Times, "How to Send Your Son Off to College." Almost guaranteed to bring a tear to your eye, no matter how young or old your kids are!

And finally, a big shout-out to all the Moms who are going back to school themselves this fall. I wish you all well, including my friend Katherine who is starting law school today. You go, Mojo Moms!

Today my life snaps back into place

I feel re-energized today. I made it to 40. No more 39.997 and holding--I have made it to the big milestone. My thirties were fantastic but I truly do feel ready for something new. It's interesting that this coincides with the first day of school, as my daughter starts fourth grade. She's a different person, too, all of a sudden. She has a new classroom & teachers, and new responsibilities. I drew a line in the sand that set the expectation that she would make own her lunch starting this year. We practiced in third grade, but she had not really taken ownership of the task.

So this morning, she set her alarm, got up on her own, and got dressed. We ate breakfast together and then she did make her own lunch and got ready to go on time. It was so civilized.

This was an incredibly simple family moment, but I mention it because this is a new phase of parenting, as I am sure that anyone with toddlers would agree!

My forties begin with my daughter's growing capability at age nine, and will conclude with her independence as she turns 19. We are at the start of a whole new season.

I am so grateful for school starting as I push to finish revising Mojo Mom. When I negotiated my deal with Gotham I said that I absolutely needed two to three weeks to work after school started, and that was the smartest request I've made so far.

During the summer our whole family felt completely untethered. That may sound freeing, but it was actually disconcerting to try to work without the support of our normal routines. Even with a fair amount of day camp (which we were privileged to have), it just wasn't the same. Today we snapped back into a satisfying framework that the school day creates for each member of our family, right down to our dog's walk schedule.

The feeling of new beginnings is in the air, and I even had a school anxiety dream last night. I dreamed that I was back teaching at my old school, and I walked in to the classroom to teach Chemistry without preparing. I opened my notebook and expected to jump right in, but found that I couldn't! Then I realized I had been away for nine years, so of course it didn't come back to me all at once.

I'll take the energy from that cautionary tale and put it back into something I do know how to do--finish my book!

For all of you Mojo Moms waiting for school to start, whether it's next week or next year, it is coming, and it's a good thing.

School's back!

I have a lot to write about this week but I had to start by saying that SCHOOL IS BACK in session here.

If you have seen High School Musical 2, you'll know the first scene where the kids count down the last few minutes until summer vacation starts, and then break out in song and dance when the moment arrives. I kept envisioning that scene playing out in reverse this morning as parents celebrated a return to normalcy.

We had lots of fun early in the summer, but by the second week in August we were as lifeless as the vegetation drying up in the 100 degree heat. It was too hot to play outside, and most of our playmates were out of town. Even my daughter said, "This was the worst summer ever!" I didn't take that too much to heart, because I have noticed a trend that if the last three weeks of the summer were boring, then kids will say the whole summer was boring. This was true even of my neighbors who took their teenagers to China!

But I am happy to be back at my desk, digging out from about 1001 emails I need to write back, piles of paper that you don't even want to know about, and reveling in a chance to plan my fall.

The sensation of freedom comes from not having to be accountable to anyone for my time during the day. I felt guilty all summer trying to write while my daughter was home. That is never a comfortable fit for us. Most of the summer, when I had a break, even a "break" to work, it had a definite and short time limit associated with it. I am a creature of habit and I am happy to report that I love my normal life, no extended "breaks" required.

***

As a final summer fun suggestion, I wanted to say that if you haven't seen the movie version of Hairspray yet, you should really catch it before it leaves the theaters. I didn't think I would like it, but I loved it and so did my parents, husband and daughter. It was exuberant, joyous, and the music was fantastic. We bought the soundtrack right after we saw the movie, and we've been singing and dancing to it all summer. Newcomer Nikki Blonsky rocks the house as the heroine Tracy Turnblad, holding her own among the incredibly talented cast members.
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I think 7-year-olds are obsessed with disguises and reality, so just deciding which hair was real and who was wearing a wig really intrigued my daughter. She couldn't get over John Travolta as Edna Turnblad. I showed her Grease the other day and it blew her mind to try to put together a hot teenage stud and an overweight, shy, age 50+ woman (who finally channels her inner mojo!) as the same person.

And yes, High School Musical cutie Zac Efron costars in Hairspray as well, as the sweet teenage heartthrob. Even if you are completely burned out on all things HSM, don't let that stop you from seeing Hairspray. It's too much fun to miss!