Wow, talk about timing

A good friend just posted this quote on her blog and it could not be more timely for me...

"We must be willing to get rid of the life we've planned, so as to have the life that is waiting for us"

Thanks litlflogr!

I want . . .

I've been struggling with the mom-work-life balance as of late. I'm not sure if the catalyst is the insane travel we have planned this Fall (partly planned in advance, partly as a result of involuntary circumstance--but for good reasons). But the long and short of it is, I want to be more balanced and am at a bit of a loss on how to achieve. The list of wants vs needs is dynamic, as one would expect, but recently I've been feeling stretched to the limits like a pizza dough that's been made too thin. Mostly, I want....

• to be the kind of mom who remembers/considers getting a Halloween costume for my child before being reminded that Halloween is approaching. I mean, last year the only reason E had any Halloween-esque attire is because Grandma kindly thought of the outfit months in advance.
• to have more time to reflect on the kind of mom I am, want to be and practice in real life
• to spend *at least* the same amount of time I do thinking about how to be better in my job and progress in my career as I do thinking about how to be a better mom and how to encourage E's development.
• to really live in the present and not think so much about how the kitchen floor is icky, the cats haven't been fed today, the tomato plants and grass haven't been watered in days, how the long work day has just killed my only workout time today and oh, I have no gas in my car. There's 40 UPS/FedEx packages on the front porch, I haven't been able to get to the banking in days and we leave for our next trip and don't have a rental car/hotel, etc. (seriously, I booked our rental car for Labour Day weekend at 11pm the night before we left).
• but to also think about the future in a different way. Not in a "what do we have to do, what do we have planned, how can we accomplish those things" way; but in a "how will this affect E, how can that help us grow as a family, how can we spend more quality time together" way.

I'm definitely seeing a need evolve here and it certainly involves less outside pressure internalized, fewer outside obligations, blocking out external needs and focusing more on the needs of our family, myself and our marriage (not that anything is wrong, but to be wholly inclusive). I need to say "no" more often and not feel bad about it. I must be better about multi-tasking less (I mean seriously, am I really doing anything better?).

In short, I need to implement simplicity in a way I've never conceived of before. It can no longer be rhetoric. It must be practiced.

Any super-full-time-working-moms out there with some solid advice on how to achieve? Please don't tell me "not to sweat the small stuff." Good message, but some real-life examples of how you did it all would be more helpful. I can't afford a personal assistant, housecleaner or nanny... so if you have some great ideas on how you did it all on your own and worked full-time, I'd be ever-so grateful.