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Time Management for Stay-at-Home
Parents
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by: Stephanie Foster
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People tend to think that being a stay at home parent
means you have time to sit in front of the TV all day, but anyone who has
tried it knows better. Staying at home means getting up early enough to get
the kids to school, take care of any children not yet in school, clean the
house, prepare meals, get the children to activities, etc. It’s not an easy
or leisurely life.
The first thing to think about are your goals. What do you need to get done
each day and what do you want to get done?
Many parents find it useful to have a calendar or day planner in a central
place in their home. This allows everyone to see what is coming up the next
day, week, etc. You may instead prefer to keep your schedule on your
computer. Don’t feel obligated to use the system that works for your best
friend, husband or anyone else. It needs to work for YOU. This only works
if you are consistent about marking your schedule. If not, you will find
this to be a very frustrating exercise. However, a good schedule can
greatly simplify your planning for each day.
Be realistic about how much time it takes to get any school age children
ready for school each day and get yourself and them out of bed
appropriately. If you get up a bit earlier than the children, you’ll have
time to make them breakfast and lunches for the school day. Alternatively,
make the lunches the night before. A good breakfast can be very helpful to
your child throughout the day.
To do lists can be very helpful. You might keep a detailed one with
everything you need to get done during the day, from feeding the baby to
pickup up the kids from school, or just a simple to do list with the
activities you do not do regularly listed.
Know your internal schedule. By this, I mean, know when you are most likely
to complete certain activities. If you are most in the mood for house
cleaning first thing in the morning, make sure you schedule it immediately.
If you’d rather wait until after lunch, do it then. Don’t forget to include
plenty of time for family activities.
If you have work at home job or home business, make sure you have plenty of
time to get your daily tasks done there. Once again, knowing when you will
be most productive will help you tremendously. Not all opportunities will
give you flexibility to change your schedule to meet your preferences, so
you may have to find ways to deal with work schedules that are not ideal.
Businesses, too, have a way of eating into other plans, so keep a certain
degree of flexibility in your daily schedule.
Everyone has things they do that just waste time. Know what you tend to do
that is unproductive. This doesn’t mean skimping on personal time. However,
if you get too interested in tiny details, perfecting things, and so forth,
you can waste a lot of time better spent elsewhere. Being disorganized also
wastes tremendous amounts of time. Write down important phone numbers,
addresses and so forth where you WILL find them easily later.
Don’t forget to include everything that uses time in your day. Your
children get out of school at a certain time, but how long does it take you
to walk or drive there?
Make sure you aren’t spending an excessive amount of time doing activities
such as watching television, surfing the internet, checking email,
gossiping with friends, and so forth. While these are certainly enjoyable
activities, if they take up too much of your day you can feel frustrated
while trying to get other, more important things done. Know how much time
you can spend on these things. Can they be moved to less stressful times of
the day? A VCR or Tivo can make it very easy to switch the time you watch
your favorite television programs. The internet and email will be there
when you have time. Friends will understand if you’re too busy for an
involved conversation if you tell them so.
Much of time management is simply being aware of what you need and want to
do and how much time you will need for it. It need not take much time at
all out of your day to plan how best to use that day.
About the Author:
Stephanie Foster is the owner
of Home with the Kids, a resource that knows that there's more to staying
home with your family than just business. From money saving tips to
parenting and marriage tips, to work at home jobs and businesses, you can
get information and support here. You can visit the site at http://www.homewiththekids.com and sign up for the
free newsletter.
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