One of my sons’ favorite books to read before bed is Busy, Busy Mouse by Virginia Kroll. It’s the story of a little mouse who sleeps all day while the house in which he lives is busy with activity. When everyone else in the house is finally asleep, the mouse wakes up and starts his busy day, doing whatever it is that mice do.

I’ve long thought there could also be a children’s book called Busy, Busy Mommy. In this book, Mommy would be busy at work during the day: talking to clients, sitting in meetings, building databases, processing invoices and driving in traffic. Once the children are asleep in bed that night, Mommy would still be working: washing the dishes, folding laundry, making lunches, signing permission slips and packing for her next business trip.

Busy, busy mommy.

My friends and I often lament that the busiest time of the year is not the holidays-which can certainly feel crazy. It’s the back-to-school season. From September through November, it seems we are flat-out with fall team sports, curriculum nights, parent-teacher conferences, religious education classes, Scouts meetings, fall festivals, early release days, school fundraisers, class projects, dance lessons and more.

Clearly, I am not alone in my busyness. Just looking at my friends’ Facebook or Twitter updates on any given Saturday confirms that my weekends are no different from any other parents’. That’s why traveling for business at this time of year seems a little bit harder to manage.  I’ll admit, there’s nothing that makes me feel worse than when one of my sons says to me, “Mommy, you’re going to miss my open house?”

Sooner or later, an important business trip is going to conflict with something equally important on your house calendar. How will you handle it? Here are some ways I try to deal with the inevitable:

1.     Get the school’s calendar as soon as you possibly can and enter all the important dates on your work calendar.

2.     As soon as the flyer comes home from school with additional dates to remember, add those to your calendar, too. Post flyers in a central location in your home so you are always reminded of important dates, or enter them into your BlackBerry and set the alarm as a reminder.

3.     If it looks like you can possibly sign up for something at your child’s school (chaperone a field trip, read to the class, volunteer in the school library) do it! But be certain the shift for which you volunteer coincides with your child’s schedule. It’s important to help the school, but getting to interact with your child while you are there and letting him or her see how much you care about education will maximize the impact of the time.

4.     When you can’t avoid missing something important like an open house, arrange to have a private showing of your child’s work on another day. Talk to the teacher about coming to the classroom before or after school with your child and have an open house for just the two of you!

5.     If your spouse is attending the open house, give him or her a handwritten note from you to leave in your child’s desk. Or, if possible, arrange with the teacher to leave it for you.

6.     If you must miss a big event like a dance recital or playoff ball game, be sure to plan another time when just the two of you do something special: go out to lunch, build a fort in the backyard, visit a museum, get tickets for the ballet or a professional ball game or just spend quality time together and, here’s the most important part, make your child the center of attention.

7.     Remember, there are lots of parents whose jobs simply don’t allow for them to jet out during the work day. Growing up, my mom was a nurse and my dad a police officer. It wasn’t like they could leave the scene of an arrest or a patient’s bedside to see me perform in the school talent show. If this is your situation, think about other ways you can get involved in your children’s activities outside of work: maybe by coaching or being a Scout leader.

I know the time will come when my kids won’t think it’s so cool having mom cheering in the stands anymore. Until then, this busy, busy mommy will just try to do what she can without making herself crazy.  Sometimes it can be as simple as having lunch with my son in the school cafeteria on a random Friday or grabbing pancakes at the corner breakfast joint on the day I’m leaving for a business trip. Shake up the routine a bit and you’ll turn a regular old day into something to remember.

How do you handle it when a business trip conflicts with something that’s important to your kids?