Milk and Cookies
with Linda and Kristen
Milk and Cookies is a savory web venue for cool products, useful tips, and idea-sharing, prepared especially for busy moms like you. From the must-haves to avoid-at-all-costs, we're dishing out tools for a delicious life balance.
Visit Linda's fitness site at Bodies in Motivation and check out Kristen's blog at Swistle.blogspot.com
My last post was loosely focused on ways to relax and take care of yourself when you have a little ‘me time’ on your hands, and this time I’d like to talk about a related subject. Namely, how in the NAME OF GOD we can find that elusive ‘me time’ when we’re so busy taking care of kids and earning a living and running errands and trying to keep our households from collapsing into pet-hair-choked ruin?
Before having Riley, I remember enjoying all kinds of free time, time that could be filled with books or matinees or leisurely dinners—or hell, just staring blankly off into space contemplating the mysterious career choices of Samuel Jackson. O, how things have changed. As most of you know, the first thing you jettison when you have a child (well, after “personal dignity” and “toned thighs”) is that whole “doing what you want to do, when you want to do it” thing. It becomes harder and harder to find more than five consecutive minutes to call your own each day when you’ve got 2958185 demands to deal with, and oh my god, it’s not even noon yet.
So, what to do when you’re trying to balance everything in your life, and the scales are off kilter? How do you make room for everything you want to focus on, so you don’t lose sight of some of the—gasp!—non-parenting things that make you happy? How can you carve out time for the hobby you love, the project you’re interested in, the activity you never get to do any more?
It’s a complicated and nearly universal problem for all parents, I think, not just moms. I don’t have any silver-bullet solutions, but I can tell you what’s worked for me:
• Trade off. My husband loves to scuba dive; I love to scour used bookstores. Both are activities reserved for the weekends, both are best when experienced sans toddler. We take turns giving each other time to get out of the house and do these things we enjoy.
• Outsource. I hemmed and hawed about getting a housecleaner for a long time—so expensive! Shouldn’t I just be doing it myself?—and now I consider it one of the best investments we make on a monthly basis in terms of sanity and time-saving. If you can afford it, I am telling you, go for it. (I recommend Angie’s List for finding a cleaner in your town, we had a great experience finding a service through them.)
• Prioritize. Is it more important to keep your house Martha-perfect, or are you able to let it be a little messy and use the time for other pursuits? Can you use your lunch break to run errands so you don’t have to do them later? How about setting your alarm just a little early, so you have the house to yourself? Ask yourself some hard questions about what you’re willing to give up in order to do the things that are important to you. In my case, I tend to let my house go to hell during the week so I have my evenings available for writing—I’m not exactly ready to entertain company at a moment’s notice, but I do have a couple hours every night to call my own.
• Get good tools. Seek out the stuff that supports your hobbies and helps you make time to devote to them. For me, that meant a laptop so I could do various computery things without being tethered to a desktop machine. Would an exercise machine motivate you to work out at home? Could a dayplanner help you stay more organized? I’m not advocating spending money on crap you don’t need, but if it can streamline your life, it might be worth it.
Finding balance is definitely an ongoing effort in parenthood, but I’m a firm believer in never losing sight of the things that make you tick, that make you happy and relaxed and fulfilled.
Now that I’ve rambled way past my word limit for this post, please do me the favor of sharing your own tips for finding time for you in your busy day. I’m sure I could learn a thing or twelve.
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Well, let’s see….it’s now 2:47am, so I guess what I do to find time for myself is stay up until an ungodly hour! I do seriously need to find a solution to this, however, because going on 4 hours of sleep with a 2 year old and a 7 month old is no good for anyone involved!
Cara | September 28th, 2007 at 8:05 am
Once or twice a month, I’ll have a Book Club meeting that starts around 7:30. What I did last night was left the house VERY early, after setting up Hubby and kid with dinner; that gave me an extra half-hour with which to visit the bookstore — ALONE! It was heavenly. I didn’t even approach the kids’ section.
el-e-e | September 28th, 2007 at 1:37 pm
I exercise during my lunch hour at work. This eliminates the need to get up early (NEGATORY) or motivate after I’ve faced hellish traffic/fixed dinner/done the bedtime rigamaroll (HELL TO THE NO).
Tessie | September 28th, 2007 at 2:23 pm
Luckily, there’s a park just a few blocks away, so my husband will take my son there when I need ME-TIME (read: blogging and aimless wandering through Target).
It took a lot for me to agree to hire a housecleaner, but man, I can’t go back.
hello insomnia | September 28th, 2007 at 4:43 pm
Me too on the exercise at work point.
I now order my groceries online (also on work time) and have them delivered. It’s only $10, and damn is it worth it to avoid the grocery store with a toddler. Plus they bring those bags right into your kitchen. Safeway and Giant both offer this service.
Jean | September 28th, 2007 at 6:06 pm
I changed the due dates of all my bills to be on the 20th of every month, so I only take out my “checkbook” twice a month - on the first for rent, and on the fifteenth for electricity, cable, etc.
I also pay all my bills online through Bank of America -dot-com. It literally takes two minutes to pay all of my monthly bills. This e-option saves me money and post-office runs too!
McWriter | September 28th, 2007 at 6:27 pm
Totally agree about the house cleaning. I bit the bullet and have someone come every two weeks. It’s the best $$ I’ve ever spent! Forget the actual time it takes to clean, the real time it frees up is all the thinking about “I should be cleaning … well I’ll clean tomorrow … well I’ll clean a little bit everyday and that will make it easier.” My 14-month old cried the 2 times she heard the vacuum, I’m pretty sure it’s b/c she has no idea what the thing is!
Christine | September 28th, 2007 at 7:58 pm
I just started doing this recently and it’s making a big difference (the difference being that I feel completely frazzled less than 20 hours a day): I try to take 10 minutes to eat breakfast without reading anything or watching anything or typing anything. (Yes, this is a big change for me.) I find that focusing on just that activity and trying to stick to it does wonders for the pace of my day, the pace of the thoughts in my head, and just how I feel overall. The effects last for a few hours so far - after that I am back to complete havoc - but I’ll take it.
Nataly | September 28th, 2007 at 8:21 pm
I find the fact that I am supremely lazy allows me MUCH more freedom than the average person. While I often hear or read people saying that they simply CANNOT relax with dirty dishes in the sink or dog hair piled up on the carpet or rings in the toilets or bathtubs…or whatever…I am the opposite, I am so lazy that I simply CANNOT get up off the couch to bother with those things after a long day at work followed by an evening toddler wrangling. Once the work day is over and the kid is in bed, my dumpy butt is ON THE COUCH until bed time. Do I sometimes fret about the dirtiness of the house? Yep, but that’s where the laziness comes in…it completely overrides that fretting. And frankly, after reading about how stressed the folks that CAN’T relax with dirty dishes in sink are, I think I might prefer being lazy.
Danell | September 28th, 2007 at 9:16 pm
For myself, I tend to sacrifice sleep and binge on coffee and energy drinks, which is probably not healthy, but allows me to sleep about four to six hours a night. Also, I found ways to make my housework a little easier, like only buying one style of socks so I never have to match them into pairs. Also, I only eat once a day, but I make a huge ass meal, that way I don’t have to worry about spending time cooking all the time and preparing lunches and all that crap. Though I guess that might not work for everyone. Also, being a man, I have a natural immunity to general filth and disorder, so I don’t have to clean much. And I suppose it is probably too late for your readers on this website, but in stead of having a child I opted for a pet boa that only requires fifteen minutes of attention and maintenance every two weeks.
Josh | September 29th, 2007 at 2:37 am
I have given myself permission, after 21 years of parenting and all things wifery, to have a housekeeper once a week and pay her to do my laundry. We eat out 1/2 the week and the other half I make meals that I really enjoy creating and serving.
I savor every minute I have alone, even if it’s behind a locked door in the bathroom for 5 minutes. I make the best of it.
Pam | September 29th, 2007 at 2:37 am
I too have a house keeper. Above and beyond a house keeper actually. For an extra $40 she cooks a weeks worth of food. I freeze some for the 2nd half of the week, and MY GOODNESS she is an incredible cook. I did the math, and with going out to eat or ordering in every night which cost us an average of $30 (or my favorite and most frequent place to patronize, the sushi joint for $80 a pop) and just spending the $ on FRESH ingredients that I pick and can SEE being made…I am saving big bucks, big time, and it is a much healthier option than pancakes for dinner (again). Did I mention she is an incredible cook? My son LOVES her and LOVES her food as well. We are all healthier because of it.
Kim | September 29th, 2007 at 4:38 pm
I find it helpful to think, “I’ll do X when the kids have left home.” That gives me way more time to do Y.
Swistle | September 30th, 2007 at 7:53 pm
In the spring, my husband took off with my now 2 year old to go visit granddad 3 hours away. I had the house to myself for 3days, it was heavenly! For the first time since my son’s birth, I was able to sleep in, have tidy house for more than 20 minutes, and calm, silence, space. We are doing it again this week and I am Oh, so ready for this!
swissmama | October 1st, 2007 at 4:53 am
My version of relaxing and having time to myself is reading a magazine or being in my car listening to Tori Amos and singing at the top of my lungs.
I guess that really isn’t much, I think I need to look into having more time for myself…..
Eric's Mommy | October 1st, 2007 at 5:40 pm
having somebody to clean my house is a must for me… I’m one of those people who can’t relax if there are dishes in the sink! My husband is also a neat freak, so having somebody who will do all of this really helps us mentally! I also pay all our bills online and I usually never have to go to the bank - I find bank lines a ridiculous waste of time!!! Why is it that they always have only 2 tellers working????
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