If you have small children and have a hard time finding “alone time” to work on getting organized, why not buddy up with a friend? Pick a specific weekday and time and then every week, take turns keeping each other’s children for a couple of hours. Your children will have fun hanging out with someone else and you’ll be a happier, more focused Mom when they return.

Try some of these quick organizing or decluttering projects while your children are away:

• Tackle one or more of the bookshelves. Decide which books you can part with and which books you will keep. Box up the books you no longer want and donate them to your local library, Goodwill or another donation site of your choice. Organize the remaining books in a way that makes sense to you.

• The average linen closet normally takes about 3 hours to organize. Pull everything out and sort the items into categories of like items with like items. Pitch expired medications, donate excess linens, towels and blankets to your local animal shelter, consolidate bottles or containers of the same thing.

• Purge your children’s toy box or play room of broken toys or toys they’ve outgrown. Box up half of the toys and keep them in the garage or basement. 6 months later, switch places by putting the toys that are currently in use into storage and put the toys that were in storage into their playroom. It will seem like Christmas to the kids. Plus, it’s less to pick up on a daily basis.