Now, I made this sound all fluffy and nice right there didn't I? Well, it is... and it isn't. It's wonderful because it's necessary for me to work right now and I really don't want to have to put both of kids in day care. But it's also hard. Extremely hard. There are days when I just don't think I can do it anymore.
But, alas, I have to. So I put one foot in front of the other and continue on. Of course things like faith and patience have helped me get through the bad days. Faith in my Heavenly Father and his love for me. I know that He knows it's hard and He will always send me the help that I need to get through it. I also have developed a patience I never knew possible. I still have moments of weakness when my patience falters and I will not only like a horrible employee but a horrible mother. But I am finding those moments to be less and less.
Ultimately though what gets me through working from home is a routine and being organized.
So here is what my days usually look like.
7-8 am: I dray myself out of bed and nurse Hayden. Ok, sometimes I nurse him in bed to snag a few more moments of sleep. This may seem like a late start but I am NOT a morning person. Then we usually all lay in bed together for a little while before we have to get up and begin another day. The kids play and rough house.
7:30-8:30 am: Get Afton dressed/ready for pre-school, fix breakfast for everyone, pack lunches and send Chad and Afton out the door for work and pre-school.
8:30-9 am: Hayden and I are usually either finishing our breakfast or cleaning the kitchen. I have a very hard time starting my work day if my kitchen is a mess. Anyone else OCD like that?
9-10 am: I will log onto my work computer from home remotely and start going through the endless emails, etc. Hayden meanwhile will play nicely with his toys (or kitchen utensils) next to me on a good day.
On a bad day, he will stand next to me and scream to be picked up.
Or better yet, crawl under my desk and try to pull the cords out.
10 am: Naptime for Hayden and the first quiet time of the day for mom. If my head is in the right place and I am motivated, I will sit right back down at my desk after putting Hayden down for his nap and start working again. Hayden usually takes a pretty good morning nap, 1.5-2 hours. So I can usually pound out 2 hours of work if I'm lucky. There are those days however, when I sit down at my desk and day dream of all of the other things I could be doing: baking, meal prepping, cleaning (yeah I dream of cleaning my toilets, sue me), organizing our house, planning my YW's lesson (I can't forget to do that), pulling out my Jillian Michaels video and sweating little, watching the next episode of the Good Wife while folding the 3 loads of laundry I did yesterday (if I am being completely honest) or more importantly sitting down to study scriptures and have some personal reflection time.
On these days when I day dream of all of these things, it's so much harder to start working again. But in the end, I am an honest person, I can't honestly get my pay check and feel good about it if I don't get in the hours I need to. So I muster up all of my determination, even if it's just a little, and start working again.
11:30-12 pm: Hayden wakes up and demands to be nursed so I take a break from work to snuggle with my little guy. Then I will usually start thinking about lunch for both me and Hayden. Also, Afton gets home from pre-school two days a week at this time so she will also need lunch and attention. If I am lucky I will have gotten in 3 hours of work up until this point. If I am unlucky, 2. Either way, I am done with half my day already and it feels like I just woke up.
12-3 pm: This time of my day always looks different depending on my children's needs and wants. Sometimes I will plug out another 2-3 hours of work if I can get the kids to play nicely with each other or watch a movie or play at the neighbors house. Sometimes, it's all I can do to get in one more hour before the kids are tearing the house apart and screaming at me for attention. I have gotten good and knowing when I can squeeze in a little more work and when I need to stop and give my kids my undivided attention.
3-4 pm: This is usually playtime with the kids/ clean up the house so it doesn't look like a tornado hit it.
4-5 pm: I should hopefully be done with work by this point and switching gears to think about dinner and the rest of the night. Most days, 90% of the time, I try and cook dinner for my family so we don't eat out. It's incredibly hard some days when I am exhausted from my work day to even entertain the idea of cooking. But I am always glad I cooked and fed my family a healthy meal from home. I don't ever regret it. Plus I meal plan for the week so hopefully I should always know what I am cooking already.
5-7 pm: It's finally the end of the day. I can relax a little and mark down another few hours of work completed, hopefully. Now it's on to waiting for dad to walk through the door and eating dinner as a family. Just because it is the end of the day though, doesn't mean things necessarily slow down. It seems like we always have a least one things going on every night these days. Between me running twice a week in the evenings with my neighbor, chad going on a bike ride to get in his exercise, pre-school board meetings, mutual for either Chad or I every Wednesday, other church activities such as enrichment for me or missionary splits with Chad, grocery shopping and random errands nights are usually a hectic rush to get somewhere or get something done.
7-8:30 pm: Finally it's bedtime! For the kid at least. We spend this time winding down. Baths, teeth brushing, reading books and saying prayers. This is ideally how every night would go. Sometimes though it's simply get your jammies on, say your prayers and get into bed Afton. We are finally at the point with Hayden that he is going to bed pretty consistently by 8:30 as well and goes down easily.
8:30 pm and on: Are you tired from listening to my day? I'm tired from living it and from writing it again. I always have grand ideas of getting so many things done after the kids go to bed. See earlier time slot when I day dreamed about all the things I needed to do. Yeah, I always think that I am going to check off at least 2 or 3 things off my to do list, but the honest truth is that most days I have only enough energy to walk down stairs and plop down on the couch.
This time in our life with young kids and busy schedules is tiring, even exhausting at times. And sure, I complain sometimes. I might wish it was different at times. But then I remember how full our lives are too. We have so many great things to be thankful for and we are involved in so many rewarding endeavors. Not to mention our kids are young and so fun right now. They are constantly making us laugh at the silly things they do. These years do go by so fast and we won't get them back once they are gone. So I am just trying to enjoy the precious little time I have when they want me to hold them and rock them to sleep. I am just trying to enjoy the days when they get so messy from eating new foods that I have to clean them in the bath tub. And I am just trying to enjoy the days when I am so tired, but so happy at the full day that I just had.
Yes, it's hard work being a stay at home mom and a work from home mom all at the same time. But I feel like I am turning into a hard working woman who is going through the refiners fire and coming out on the other end a much stronger and much more loving and patient person. I am learning that our trials do indeed make us stronger and honestly I wouldn't want to change my life right now. If and when I don't need to work from home anymore I am sure I will sit down and think "what do I do now?"
