Work, Mama-hood & Balance

This is from a couple years back – how little were the girls!!

No matter your family, working and being a mama is ever easy. With three homeschooled kiddos and a business to run, life can get pretty hectic. While I know I’m lucky to be able to work from home, and be with the kiddos, balancing multiple roles can get tricky. I get a lot of emails and comments from people asking how I manage to fit it all in. Some weeks, my diary looks insane. With homeschool, blogging, a jewelry business to run, kiddos groups/social events as well as actually looking after them and running a house, I often need to be in several places at once.

When I first started out as self-employed a couple of years back, I would try and multi-task. Try and homeschool, make the lunch, write a blog post and tidy up ALL AT ONCE. This is a sure fire way to go crazy! ha! I ended up rushing around like a crazy lady, the kiddos knew they didn’t have my full attention and made sure I knew they knew and it would take me longer than it should to get everything done.

Next, I tried being a mama in the day, and self-employed in the evening when the kiddos were in bed. That worked a little better, but meant I had no down-time, I was up till stupid o’clock working, and then tired and cranky the next day. Still not good!

These days, I’ve managed to get a better grip on balance. I’ve learnt to juggle multiple roles, yet only try and be one thing at a time. An average day for us goes a little like this: I wake up, sneak outta bed, make coffee, feed the animals, check my emails & blog. Kiddos get up, we all have breakfast together, then get dressed. If it’s nice, we often go for a quick walk, to the park or just round the block. Mornings are ‘home school’ time – the girls do their maths/english, work on projects, etc… Lunch time rolls around, and then I usually try and have an hour or two of work time. Pack orders, blog, catch up on emails, schedule tweets etc. After my worktime, we’ll do something family oriented – library, swimming, crafts. Then it’s dinner time, games or stories, baths and bedtimes.

Occasionally, if G isn’t working, I’ll get a few hours to myself. I love this time – a quiet house means I can get so much work done! It’s great to get ahead of myself, and tick off my to-do list! This routine seems to work fairly well for us. Some days are all family time, other days have a little more work time – but over all it’s finally hit a pretty good balance. I think that being self-employed, especially when you have children at home, requires a lot of organisation and focus. I have to stay organsied, make endless lists, and make myself stay focused on the task at hand.

Life is still busy, but most days aren’t as stressful as they used to be. Tring to only wear one hat at a time makes things a little bit easier! Do you work from home with children around you? How do you fit everything in?