What did you do to make life easier when returning to work?

[Onedropbeat]

Il be returning to work soon

I have 2 children, one in school and one not quite a year old

Il be working full days (out of the house between 7:30-5:30) so wondering what ways I can help organise home life to keep things running smoothly

At the moment I take Greta pleasure in spending time buying nice ingredients and cooking nice dinners from early afternoon and so I know we’re going to have to move over to online shopping and quicker meals

Is there anything that you did that made your life easier?

All housework shared with oh if you have one. Batch cooking, keeping a stock of things like fresh pastas / ravioli / pasata / pesto (shop bought or home made) so you can get dinner on quickly. School aged child could be in charge of loading the washing machine or the drier if they can be trusted.

We divided up days. There were days that were mine and I fully focussed on work and there were days that were dh's to fully focus on work. On our less busy days, we did everything around the house. This is somewhat dictated by my work schedule as I work long hours and have a long commute. But for example, Tuesday/Wednesday/some Thursdays, I'm out of the house early, dh does all the getting kids up and dressed and breakfast and school runs, homework, cooking dinner, etc. I'd get home in time for them to be going up to the bath. On the other 2-3 days, I do everything so dh can focus on work.

It meant that 'all the stuff' by default didn't just fall to one parent and meant we each had time to carve out for really busy working days, late meetings, etc.

Meal planning and being very conscious of how to make it so we didn't have to cook every night. I don't batch cook or do freezer meals, but I do plan 1-2 meals a week that will last for leftovers the next night. So we still have home cooked meals every day, but we aren't cooking them every day. At the moment, I'm working from home, so it's different as both of us are around more, but we'd also do 2-3 nights a week of really simple or ready meals. It took the pressure off whoever was the parent at home doing dinner to spend much time or energy cooking.

Big household jobs get done at the weekend, and we just do the bare minimum during the week. Having a cleaner also made a big difference, but we haven't had one for the past two years as just couldn't sort it and then COVID happened.

Definitely cooking as little as possible for the first couple of weeks and relying on pre-prepped foods or the slow cooker. Leave proper cleaning for the weekends and just bare minimum during the week.

A travel mug for coffee on the go to work.

A cleaner 1-2 hours a week, as we spent our weekends cleaning and didn't have time for each other.

Wrap around care at the school.

Takeaways on Friday night when you are shattered!