Anybody else struggle with working from home?

[staranise]

As in, I'm meant to be working right now and am paying a fortune in childcare to enable me to do so but just can't get motivated, especially when I work sitting on my bed plus keep jumping up and down to put another load of washing on, tidy up some toys etc etc.

I normaly ban MN on work days but feeling weak today...

Wouldlove some colleagues to keep me focussed...

I have a childfree couple of hours (or until DD3 falls out with her friend again - I hate this 6 year old falling out stage) so really ought to get on with some work..... but there are some interesting-looking threads out there.....

More packing boxes today. I have 700 books...do you think I read too much? We're watching Nina and the Neurons at the moment and I'm finding it really interesting. I haven't done much work today: about half an hour.

BBL - 700 books, hey - I almost feel motiated to count mine but think I might be horrified - my DH keeps telling me I should get rid of them if I've read them before (he is not a reader and therefore has not a clue) so that we don't have to transport them all to Australia next year!
OK, on a quick scan I have 500 books in my bedroom alone... oh dear.

My DH keeps humpthing around the house muttering 'we'll need more boxes for all these books'. He also isn't that much of a reader but he has a fair few DVDs which I don't moan about and his parents are 'kindly' going to give us six boxes of Dr Who books from the 1970s/80s that he hoarded as a kid to take to our new house - whoopie do!

I've had a bit of urgent work to do this morning. Off to water my friend's plants in a minute as she is on holiday.

i am very impressed that i have managed to do 1 1/2 hous work on a prospectus this a.m. despite my marauding 8mo DS's determination to play with mummy's laptop! Am mostly distracting him with the tv remote but it's just not quite the same...

Just popping by to report and extraordinary bout of work from me this week! Have just claimed three full days for Mon, Tues and Weds and am plugging away again today.

Mind you am determined to fit a run in today and get my fat bum into gear after weeks of cake and idleness. Have put a stone on since I reached my target weight at Xams. That said am just heading downstairs for coffee and choc.

lol at laundrylover!
I went for a big powerwalk on Monday to try and rebuild some missing buttock musculature - dunno where they went! and have spent the rest of the week since recovering from the extraordinary physical exertion .
Doing well on the client front this week and not too bad on the freelance work - money is definitely a good motivator!

Plus, and I may be alone in this, I feel that there are fewer MN threads around that I wasnt to be involved in at the mo so less timewasting!

well, this motivation lark isn't going too well this week - I have started keeping a time sheet now as am fully freelance, but so far haven't done enough hours!! Must crack on, must switch off MN, must sleeeeeppp....
Dammit! That's half the problem, getting to start work after 10pm, coming onto MN "just for a few mins" and then being stuck here for hours [grrr - Damn you, MN!) and then being too tired to actually do any blasted work.

Must sort myself out...

BBL - how's the packing going?

Still packing...doing a bit each day. This week is supposed to be our last week here (hoping to move on Tuesday if we exchange contracts in time). The house is all echoey and horrible. It's not my lovely house at the moment. Really sad to be leaving. Only cried once yesterday. That's not bad for me! As for work? Hardly got time for such frivolities!

Oh dear Becky - I do feel sorry for you. I will be in the same boat (with knobs on!) next Spring when we move to Australia. I'm very fond of my little house here and will miss it something terrible - I feel a wee bit silly about that but it really is my shell and comfort place, so leaving it is going to be quite hard. At least we're not selling it - but in some ways that's worse because we're going to have to rent it to other people who can't possibly love it like I do. Ah well.

Presumably your work will continue when you get set up in your new house, will it? It's not area-dependent?

I could do my work on top of a mountain so long as I had a laptop, telephone and the internet. It would also be useful if CityLink could reach me but I'm sure they'd get to my mountain easily enough...

It's horrible leaving. At least I am only going two hours, not twenty-four hours, away... Are you going to Australia for ever and ever?

I can't imagine not being in this house. I fell in love with this house on first site and I've had two children here and I've told DH he will have to drag me out kicking and screaming.

First site??? What is my job again?? Oh dear.

at site...
Well, the theory is for ever and ever as DH is Australian and his family are there but he has said we will give it 3 years and see how we are going there and make a firm decision then. I think he is very worried about how I am going to cope with it all and doesn't want to be too insistent on anything. But unless things go very badly for us in Australia, it is likely to be fairly permanent.

I will be keeping my house and reviewing that on a 5-yearly basis, just in case. I firmly believe that if I sell it now we will never be able to come back to the UK and buy again, even if we want to. But after a while, the onus of renting it out might be too much to bother with.

Just thought I'd pop in - have had curiously organised month this month. Have had more work on, and more still coming, but have managed to be, for me, super organised and am not, currently, working evenings or weekends but sticking to my three days a week childcare.

Think the main things have been strictly rationing MN, getting on with the big tasks and fitting the little fiddly things that between them could take up a morning in between. But mainly it is concentrating and getting my head down. Maybe it's the rain!

Hi TT - well done you! I am getting a bit better (despite being here at this hour) and have managed to acquire an old keyboard so that DS can "work" on "his" keyboard rather than mine - that helped a lot!

I aim to be more organised but it seems every day there is something that prevents me from doing so; whether it be a waily baby, or a doc's appt, or a client coming or whatever - but it all interferes with The Schedule for the freelance work. Ah well, early days, I' sure I'll sort it out.

Know exactly where you're coming from. It is difficult when you are at home and see all the housework that needs doing yet need to be making some pennies!

I find the loneliness of working from home on your own difficult as I'm used to being part of a team. If I get into these forums I'm snookered as hours can go by without you realising.

Do you go to any networking groups at all?? I don't mean the pressured BNI type etc but I go to a great ladies network and have made some great contacts as well as friends in the same boat who I can link up with when I need to. A good site for finding these in your area is www.findnetworkingevents.com or ][http://www.wireuk.org]]is another support for ladies in business

It is tough when you're having one of those days though!

Hooray - ds back to pre school tomorrow!! At last - can get some proper work done at home.
I've also got half a dozen bags of clothes I need to return to half a dozen different shops - not to be tried with ds in tow.
And I can maybe get to the gym - and get food shopping done properly.
Oooh - I can't wait!
I've had a look on that website mummysmagic - but the couple I looked at for Glasgow mentioned something about decision makers and entrepeurs! - A bit daunting!

ok am now panicking a little - I have only done 16 hours out of the 42 I should have done this month (although to be fair I did lose the entire 1st week because I hadn't been able to meet with my boss to discuss what needed doing) - ARGH!
Really shouldn't be on here now, but it is quite hard to concentrate this late at night and I might end up putting the wrong things in the wrong place in the documents on which I am working currently.

If only DS would nap more without me sleeping beside him during the day....

Would he sleep in a sling thumbwitch - or is he too old? then you could carry on typing!

I'm dreading doing my timesheets/invoicing for Aug - I've hardly got any billable time I'm sure.

Still - no nursery fees to pay out - so some consolation.

I'm moving house tomorrow. Ahhhhh! I haven't been able to do any work for two days and doubt I'll get any done tomorrow or the following day. That's the bummer about being a freelancer: you can't just take holiday and have someone else cover for you.

TracyK - he's just too heavy for my back to cope with it, unfortunately - I get a bad enough back just from typing so he would make it a LOT worse and then it would be more visits to the osteo and all my hard-earned cash would disappear...

BeckyBL - for you, I hope the weather is ok for the move and it all goes smoothly - are you getting people in to move you or is it a DIY job? I hope it is a positive day and not too sad for you.

Hope all went well BeckyBL - are you all settled in - you have got broadband haven't you????

Got a couple of chargeable hours done this morning - but time just disappears. ds pre-school is only till 12 or pay for wraparound care till later. 12 is far, far too early to be picked up imo!!

Getting a bit fitter walking to and from school twice a day - getting blooming soaked though!

Are you settled in yet BeckyBL? I hope it went well and everything arrived intact (including your SOH )

Am being rubbish at getting on with work; DS is now teething and being ultra clingy - AND he can now pull himself up to standing by climbing up me when I'm trying to work (sat on the bed that he is playing on) so I can hardly take my eyes off him even for a second! Plus last night he was up 5 times which fries my brain even worse than normal and here I am on MN again instead of getting on with my work! AAaaaghhh!

BeckyBL, I hope you are set up on MN for work again and settled in ok?

Still being crap with freelance work but hey. Have proper deadlines to work to now so that helps - means I can do half an hour here and there and then 2 days solid prior to the deadline as normal!

Anyone else celebrating the start of school???