My husband and I have a change jar. We’ve had one since we were engaged, and we’ve always filled it up with excess coinage or cash we found in coat pockets, or got from odd jobs. When I find a bill in the washing machine, it goes in the jar. And it’s great – we use the money to treat ourselves on vacations, or buy something we really need that wasn’t in our budget.  It works for us, almost better than a savings account, because we can literally see how are savings is increasing.

Unfortunately, this isn’t the case with time – at least not for me. Like most working moms, I am always looking for ways to be more productive. This usually boils down to reducing time spent on undesirable tasks (this means cleaning for me), and saving up time for more desirable pastimes (relaxing with family or reading a book).

I estimate that in the past three months, I’ve come across at least twenty five magazine or newspaper articles on saving time. Real Simple magazine had almost an entire issue devoted to it, and last Sunday’s Parade had ideas as well. Sometimes they are lists, sometimes they are stories, and sometimes they are instructional guides. And they almost always have great ideas, some of which I’ve implemented.

Sounds great, right? Well, here’s the issue. I do all these things like going to the grocery store in the middle of the week and loading all of my silverware in the same compartment in the dishwasher – but I never feel like I’ve saved any time. At the end of each day, I’m still exhausted, drained of patience, and have at least one household chore to do or work-related article to write. I can’t help but have the old cliché run through my head: where did the time go?

Of course I know the answer to this. Somewhere in my day I use that time for some other thing I’ve put off, or to research an assignment for work. But I’m pretty sure that the point of saving time isn’t so you can spend more time working or doing chores. I can set aside time in the day to do things like pay bills and write, but I can’t seem to set aside extra time for – well, having extra time. I know other working moms feel the same.

I think part of our problem is that we invest so much energy into making lists, establishing priorities and meeting deadlines, that we not only can’t recognize extra time, but wouldn’t know what to do if we had it. Think back on your time before you had kids or your job – it’s probably clear to you know how much free time you had!

What I would really love, is to invent a way to drop my saved minutes in a jar, and redeem them at a later time. Too bad I can’t find the time to do that.

How do you make the most of the time you save? What are your strategies for making sure you take time for your favorite pastimes?