Do you sometimes feel as if life is one mad rush and you often hear yourself saying, "I don't have the time"? Looking after your children and your family leaves you with little energy for much else, and can often leave you exhausted at the end of the day. Plus, if you are a housewife, you probably feel that though you work hard, your work is seldom appreciated, and nothing annoys you more than someone saying, "What do you do all day anyway? Don't you get bored?" Only you know how you run around all day, and those who don't run a house, just don't know what you mean when you say you've been busy all day.

However, there are ways in which you can make your life easier. All it takes is some organization, and time management. Here are some tips.

Set your priorities

This is possibly one of the most important tasks of all. Decide your priorities, and let one of your top priorities be your own health. No, this does not make you selfish. In fact, only if you first look after yourself, will you be able to look after your children wholeheartedly and cheerfully. Your children don't want to see you tired and stressed out all the time. They want to see you happy, healthy, willing and able to spend quality time playing with them. So, first of all, keep time aside for yoga or exercise everyday. Plan your chores around this.

Make a list

Unless you start keeping a list of things that needs to be done, you will find that you just keep running around in circles, managing to do half the amount of work in double the time. Make a list of everything you need to do, and refer to it constantly.

Make a weekly list

Make a weekly list of things that need to be done within a week or so, and then decide what you will do for the day. Keep location in mind when deciding what to do on a particular day. For example, if you have to return a movie to the library and you need to buy a dog collar, do both things on the same day if the library and pet shop are in the same neighbourhood. You can only do this if you start dividing your list of things to do into 'things to do today.'

Limit grocery shopping

Do groceries once a week. Make this is rule. If you run out of something, cook something else or ask that it be delivered - unless you are entertaining and want to make something special. This way you will not be constantly running to the grocery store to buy something. Otherwise you will find that most of your time goes just shopping for food - time that could have been spent exercising, or with your children.