What are your top tips for making family life work ?

[carriemumsnet]

While we wait with bated breath for the results of our work/life balance survey we thought we'd tap you for your top tips on how you make family life work, in terms of work/life balance, family time, sharing responsibilities for children/ house /money etc

How do you make the parenting partnership (great phrase eh? ) work in your house?

Feed and rest your children properly and they are much nicer (they need feeding more regularly than you'd believe)
Expect and insist on your partner being fair in how much time he puts into the family. Ideally discuss this seriously before you have children.
Daddies do bathtimes while mummies drink wine. Lovely bonding time for daddies, mental health time for mummies.
Don't work all hours.
Be flexible
Think before you say no to your children. DO you really need to say no?
All be polite to each other - children learn from example (though the results are not immediately obvious)
Get a cleaner if you can remotely afford it (much more important than, say, Sky Plus)

Oh yes, make time for yourself, be it a pedicure or a night out with mates. Do what makes you feel really happy and relaxed. For me, it's a cappuccino or two and the paper for an hour or so in a local cafe after Friday nursery drop off.

You can have it all but only if you have enough help -

a cleaner
a gardener
an aupair

and sharing the chores

Sky Plus costs us £17 a month, so my advice would be get Sky Plus, its cheaper than a cleaner and does much to improve family harmony.

Oh right

So, are we all following the assumption that everyone has a "parenting partnership".

Nice. I suppose you aren't looking for tips from all us single parents then? Or is there already the assumption that we don't make family life work?

or are we not really "families"?

Explain stuff to your kids. Try to never say "Because I told you so". If you explain it thoroughly enough, drawing diagrams if necessary, they'll fall asleep, thus resolving the issue.

Ah, OMDB, just think of it as one less stressful element of family life you don't have to negotiate! Of course you are a family, but in many families, difficult/useless/wellmeaning but annoying blokes are a real issue. My own mum was a much happier, better parent as a single parent.

Does anyone make it work?

Cor.

You might be able to have it all, but you can't do it all. If doing it yourself is important to you, you won't be able to have it all simultaneously (but you might not care, either)

Oh I know that MisDemeanor, and I'm enjopying the fact that my life is far less stressful than people with spouces, it was just the wording in carrie's OP that made me rather annoyed.

It was the assumption that all families involve a parenting partnership, or at least everyone with tips for making family life work would have a parenting partnership.

My tip? Ditch the waste of spase husband. Then family life will work.

Don't care what anyone thinks about the way you manage your family, especially not your in laws.

Keep your MIL at arm's length from the outset and make up your mind very slowly indeed as to whether you wish to get closer to her or not.

I do think, seriously, that quite a lot of the time in practice, for a lot of us, it doesn't work. The key thing is to try and manage/negotiate, day by day, something that is vaguely workable for everyone. And yes, in practice that also means that not everything is a compromise or a team effort; sometimes one person loses.

LOLOL at you lot anf forward planign objectives
waht wankage

I agree Hassled. Explain stuff to your kids.

Don't sweat the small stuff.

A tidy house is not important. It doesn't matter if your kids draw all over the walls. It doesn't matter if the sofa gets sticky marks on it. It doesn't matter if the beds aren't made. It doesn't matter if your DC decides not to wear a coat one day. IT doesn't matter if you ignore them sometimes. You are allowed to put yourself first.

When I say manage/negotiate, obviously that means 'have frequent rows that degenerate into swearing a lot'...

I think it matters if your kids draw on the walls! I'd be flipping fuming!

Not wankage Cod. Unless you want you and your children to rot in middle England somewhere

what do you mean?

Oh yes, housework overrated. Move next to your kids' school. Drink wine.

I would schedule my marriage....if I was a completely different person...(probably a better person with more money)

I mean, if you want you and your children to actually have proper opportunities in life and go places, you need to think ahead. Eg you don't just wake up one day aged 18 and say "Hey, maybe I should go to university in the US" and apply and get in.

You know that much.

Living day to day / month to month just doesn't cut it.

And when each member of the family has medium and long-term projects and ambitions, the rest just falls into place IME.

Ah, it's another world...