Every year at this time I start to wonder if I can really hack being a mom and being employed 4 days a week. The kid’s extracurriculars all end in the same week, there’s a dance performance to attend (and organize family and friends to attend also) and the school year is winding down – with field trips and other end of year events. Throw onto that the nice weather and my desire to get gardening and just generally be outside more, and then my blog. Sometimes just blogging and working outside the home is enough stress – June just adds to my busy life!
This year we have a little extra stress as my husband is involved with a big renovation project at his mother’s place. What that means is he’s not home until 10pm or later almost every day. While that doesn’t really impact our home life (besides that the kids don’t see him much during the week) it does mean I stay up later than I otherwise would so we can have time to catch up on our days together. That makes me feel extra tired, but I know this is just temporary and I do like having our chats so I guess I’ll just make more coffee in the mornings.
I have a great network of family and friends who help me look after my kids when I need to be working. Now that both the girls are in school, the need has lessened a little, but everyone is still there to help us out. I recently authored a post about surviving as a working mom. I could not get by without the “village” that helps raise my kids.
When I started blogging I really had no idea what was involved. I naively thought I would just write some stuff and people would read it. While that is the idea of blogging, no one can read what you write if you don’t share it across the internet. And that takes a lot of time – and a lot of social media websites. I recently joined up to Pinterest and strangely I’ve seen an increase in my blog views over the last few days, even though I only have about 15 followers. It’s wild!
My blog schedule (if I can call it such a thing – there’s no actual scheduling done ahead of time) is pretty wishy-washy. I work on posts and social sharing either while the kids are eating breakfast or after they are in bed. This is not a lot of time in the week. Sometimes I can have a few hours on a weekend if Patrick takes the kiddos to a build at a hardware store, or to a movie, so that helps me get some stuff done. And Wednesdays are my “day off” during the week so I can usually fit in an hour or two there, around all the laundry, tidying, grocery shopping, and whatever else I need to jam into my one free weekday.
I have been known to occasionally jot down a thought in the middle of my work days, but I try had not to think too much about my blog while I’m at work – easier said than done! On my breaks I browse some social media sites, or tweet a blog post from a day or two ago, and then wonder why I don’t feel like I really had a “break.” Now that it’s nice out, I go outside to eat my lunch and that forces me to be disconnected for a few minutes in my day. Although I find I want to snap photos when I’m outside, but that’s a story for another post!
What will my future bring? Who knows – blogging and working are on my life plan for a long time yet. Ideally I’d love to use my blog to bring in some cash flow and cut back my outside the home work hours. Right now this is just a dream, but there’s hope that I’ll see it happen. I don’t really like the idea of placing ads on my blog – I feel it detracts from the writing – and I’m not popular enough to really get into sponsored posts yet. Reviews are my forte at the moment, and I’m branching out there a bit – getting into travel posts and hotel reviews – which saves us some money, but no making money there yet. (If you’re interested in working with me for review posts or any other blog related business, contact me!)
Do you work outside the home and blog? Leave me a comment and share your tips for keeping a work-life balance. Bonus points if you’re a parent because that is also a full-time job!
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