Please can you share your daily routines for juggling work and home life?

[BusyHomemaker]

Apologies if this has been covered before...

I have a 15mo DD and am setting up a business selling products for crafters online and at markets. I've just started my first draft of my business plan and am already finding it a challenge to organise my day.

Please could you lovely newsletters who are self- employed/ work from home share how you do it?

Many thanks in advance :)

With great difficulty, at times - but at least I have some childcare which I think is key.

Mon & Fri - "days off" with DS2 at home (reality, I take calls/deal with emails with him around. He sometimes watches more CBeebies than is ideal...)
Tues - Thurs - I have childcare from 9-3 so work during those hours

The reality is that I have about 15 hours of childcare a week, but generally have about 21 - 25 hours worth of work to do. So the difference gets made up in the evenings and sometimes at a weekend if I'm really stretched.

I enjoy having the flexibility to fit work in around school hours etc as I want, but I'm not very good at setting boundaries between work and home - perhaps other people can advise you better on that. The difficult part is fitting in all the domestic stuff that has to be done, particularly if I work in the evenings.

I became self employed when my DD was aged one. My routine then looked something like this:

DD would wake up at 6.00am, while preparing breakfast I would turn my laptop on. I would then leave this on until I went to bed at night and keep checking and replying to any emails that came through. This did not take much time so easy to achieve while my DD was around.

DD gave up naps at only 18 months and before that only used to nap for about an hour so I could never use nap times for work.

DD went to bed at 8pm so I would work on client work 8pm-11pm Monday to Sunday, which gave me 20 hours a week of time I could spend on client work and 1 hour a work on my invoicing etc.

Now DD is 3 she goes to preschool 5 mornings a week for the funded hours so my routine now looks like this:

Monday to Friday: Take DD to preschool and switch laptop on at 9.15. Keep laptop on until I go to bed as before and answer emails through out the day.

9.30-11.30am client work while DD is at preschool.

11.45am leave to pick DD up from pre-school

8pm DD goes to bed so I work 8pm-10pm on client work.

Weekend evenings: Sort out my invoicing etc. and do any emergency client work that has come in.

So I probably work about 25 hours per week now.

I am expecting baby number 2 so will go back to my 8.00-11.00pm 7 days a week routine when DC2 is born until they start pre-school!

I do all housework after lunch when DD has one hour 'quiet time' (tv time!!!), and then wash up and hoover after dinner before DD goes to bed. This still leaves me all the time DD is at home and awake to spend with DD, we just do not do the bath, bed routine, she has a bath in the afternoon, and the bedtime routine is a story and straight to bed so only takes 15 minutes including teeth brushing.

I find it fine to work 20 hours a week without childcare when children are sleeping but it does mean I do not get to spend my evenings in front of the tv etc.

I hope that helps somewhat :)

I find getting up early in the morning the best to get work done. I get up at 5.45 and at laptop by 6 and get research, emails and marketing done, I plan my day from there and try as best I can to stick to it! Good luck!

I guess the key thing is to be disciplined. I'm sure I can fit in a couple of hours first thing and then again after DD goes to bed. As my business grows I'll look into childcare. Thank you all for your responses and insights.

Good luck and I hope it goes well for you.