I mentioned the other day that one of my goals for June was to make over my mornings. Lately, I’ve been woken up every morning by one of my girls crying. I always want to get up early, but with my girls still not sleeping through the night, I always justified sleeping in. Being woken up by my girls crying was not setting my day up for success. I knew this, yet I still couldn’t get myself to get up before them.
Make Over Your Mornings – Flash Sale TODAY only!!
Yesterday, I mentioned one of my goals was to make over my mornings. Crystal Paine from MoneySavingMom.com put together a 14-day course on setting your day up for success – Make Over Your Mornings. With two little ones, I knew this course was for me.
I’m going to share my review of the course later next week once I complete it, but today I read through some of the lessons and watched some of her videos. One thing Crystal touches on is the difference between starting your day by yourself versus having it begin with little ones tugging at you or, in my case, screaming for me from the next room. My little ones still don’t sleep through the night, so I often justify not waking up early. I sleep until they wake me and our mornings are oftentimes very hectic because I had absolutely no time to gather my thoughts and plan my day.
However, this course is not just about waking up early. It’s about giving yourself time to set your day up for success and learn to schedule your day appropriately. Crystal also mentions how we can run around like crazy all day putting out fires (this is especially true for moms!) but have very little to show for it at the end of the day.
If you’re hoping to end chaotic days in your life and be more productive, this course is for you.
While I haven’t completed the course yet, I wanted to let anyone who’s interested know that TODAY ONLY (Tuesday, 6/2) the course will be on sale all day!! And – of course – the early birds get the worm, meaning the early birds get the lowest price. The course originally retails for $17, but tomorrow the sale will be as follows:
The Crazy-Can’t-Miss-Low-Low-Low Launch Sale Prices:
- 12 a.m. to 7 a.m. ET on June 2, 2015 – just $5!!! {This is worth getting up early for!}
- 7 a.m. to 12 p.m. – just $7!
- 12 p.m. to 5 p.m. – only $10!
- 5 p.m. – 12 a.m. – only $13!
And like I said, I’ve skimmed through a few of the lessons and so far I think they are incredibly worth it. Each lesson takes less than 15 minutes to complete. If you have a good chunk of time on your hands, you can work through multiple lessons per day and complete the course sooner. I’ve already posted my new morning routine on our fridge and tomorrow will be the first day I’m starting it!
Stay tuned for my full review next week!
How to make the most of your weekends
I just came inside from sipping an iced coconut coffee on our back deck. Afternoons are one of my favorite parts of the day – the girls are napping, I’m able to get a little work and cleaning done and then I try to relax for a bit before the girls wake up. For me, weekdays are very similar to weekends except my husband isn’t home most days during the week. I prefer weekends to weekdays simply because he is here and I try not to do any work 🙂
Freelancing as a stay-at-home parent
I’ve mentioned it on the blog quite a few times before about how I freelance from home while also watching my 2 1/2 year old and 1 year old daughters. I know I’m not the only work-from-home parent out there, either, so I like to share tips here and there that make my life a tad bit more manageable.
For starters, we just enrolled them in daycare last week which has immensely reduced my amount of stress. They only go 10 hours per week, but that’s 10 whole hours that I can strictly devote towards work, completely free of distractions. Usually, they take a long afternoon nap which also helps! We only pay $85 each week and I usually make at least that in one day of them being gone (they are gone a total of three hours, three times per week).
Today, I’m over on The Penny Hoarder sharing 7 Smart ways to be more productive as a freelancing stay-at-home parent. I would love it if you checked it out! And if you have any other strategies for working from home when watching little ones, please let me know!
photo credit: flickr via Erik Eckel
5 Ways to manage being a work-from-home mom
Happy Friday!! I don’t know about you, but this week definitely flew by!! My husband had the first few days off of work which was SO NICE. I cannot express how nice it is having an extra set of hands around here so I can get ahead on work.
Since he works for himself, he does have times that he’s slower and it’s not by choice. We’ve been very fortunate since moving to NC and he’s been booked pretty solid two weeks to a month in advance. That ended this past week and he had nothing on the books set in stone. While normally I would have been panicking, I’m much more confident in both him and our financial situation. We save for times like this and I have full faith in my husband that he will find more work. Sure enough, he got work for Thursday, Friday and Saturday…plus has the next few weeks booked up. Now when he’s randomly off, we take advantage of extra time with our family, we run errands and get caught up on doctor’s appointments and we cook more!
So, in some other exciting news – we’ve decided to get the girls enrolled in a part-time daycare program. I’ve come to the conclusion that if I really want to grow a business while being a mom, I need some help. I’m currently able to do what I do with them home, but since I’m looking to increase my workload it just makes sense that I get them enrolled in a program. I’m excited for new opportunities with work and I’m happy my girls will get some fun socialization a few days a week in a loving environment!
Speaking of working from home, today I’m over at Wealth Gospel discussing 5 Ways to manage being a work-from-home mom. If you work from home with kids, or even are just at home with kids, I have some good tips that I’ve been using for the past 2 1/2 years to help me stay organized and get things done!
Happy Friday, everyone! I have some great posts lined up for next week and can’t wait to share them!
Keeping your relationship a priority when working from home
Anyone that works from home knows that it can be hard to separate your work life from your home life. That means emails may be checked while playing with your kids, blog ideas may be brainstormed when cooking dinner and you may be spending your evenings glued to your computer instead of with your loved ones. I know all about this first hand, as I’ve been working from home (with kids, no less) for nearly three years now. Along the way, it’s been a top priority of mine to not lose sight of the important things in life – especially my marriage. With close to half of all marriages ending in divorce, I want to make sure mine isn’t one of them. While I truly enjoy working and love what I do, it shouldn’t be my entire life.
Today I’m sharing tips on how I manage to keep my relationship a priority while working from home with little kids over on Tie the Money Knot. If you’ve been struggling with balance in your life, this isn’t a post you’ll want to miss! Head on over and check it out!
One simple way to save time and money
In life, there are two things everyone wouldn’t mind having a little more of – and that’s time and money. I would love to have more time to spend with loved ones, more time to cook yummy meals and desserts, more time to spend working and more time to spending relaxing. And who wouldn’t want more money? I would save more, invest more, give to charity, help out those in need and probably shop more, too.
Since moving from Arizona to North Carolina, I feel like I’ve discovered the secret to having both more time and more money.
5 Ways to stay motivated when working from home
Working from home definitely comes with it’s fair share of challenges. I have two little kids (read a typical day in my life here) and I recently wrote a post on how to be productive when working from home with kids. I stay productive in a number of ways – I try to wake up early so I can get a jump-start on my day, I tire the girls out in the morning with an activity that way they’re (more likely) to take a solid, very necessary, afternoon nap, I always work ahead of time and I work every single day. Yup, even weekends (I’m trying to give myself one “rest” day, though).
How to be productive when working from home with kids
My girls are wonderful, and I love them more than anything, but at ages 2 and 1 they are a handful and a half! From the moment I wake up until they take naps, it’s chaos. I get an hour or so of peace during nap time, then it’s chaos again until bedtime.
So, how do I still manage to bring in $1500 a month (on average) without the help of daycare or family? I’m glad you asked…
I wake up early. Usually, haha, my husband would probably argue otherwise. The girls normally wake between 7:30 and 8:00, so I try to get up by 7:00 at the latest to have coffee, read blogs and relax before the chaos ensues. Sometimes, I’ll get up at 6:00 and start working, other times I stay in bed until the girls wake up. That’s one of the joys of working from home 🙂
Nap time is a MUST. Anyone with little kids knows just how precious nap time is. I couldn’t get through my days without it! That being said, I try to do an activity with the girls in the morning to tire them out for the afternoon. This morning, for example, we went to the library, walked down to a local coffee shop and stopped by the grocery store. We were only gone about two hours, but the girls are both sleeping peacefully right now.
I write lists each day. I’m a list-maker and a goal-setter by nature. If it’s on my list, the task is going to get accomplished that day no matter what. I leave no room for error, BUT…
I ALWAYS work ahead. If an assignment is due on the 10th, I complete it by the 8th. If invoices are due on the 20th, mine’s in by the 18th. THIS is how I leave room for error. If an emergency comes up and an article on my to-do list doesn’t get done, I still have a few days to complete it without panicking. (I will say, though, that this has never happened. Talk about type A personality.)
I work everyday. I know, I KNOW. This sucks, and is actually something I’m trying to get better at. How I see it, though, is if on Saturday afternoon my girls are napping and my husband is watching football, my time is best spent busting out an assignment. That gets me ahead even further and allows extra time with my girls during the week when my husband is at work. It’s really hard not to think like this. If I have the time, I’m going to be working. Having two kids allows for plenty of “unwinding time” – park trips, play dates, walks around the neighborhood, playing with toys, baking together, etc.
When I’m working, I’m incredibly focused. Whether I’m writing an article, answering emails or editing, I stay focused on the task at hand. The internet is definitely a huge time-suck, so I don’t allow myself to log onto Facebook or read my favorite blogs until I’ve completed the assignment at hand. This method not only keeps me from getting distracted and prolonging the length of time to get an article done, it also motivates me to complete it so I can goof off, haha.
I like what I do. And finally, the best reason I’m able to stay productive is because I really enjoy what I do. The fact that I can provide some extra income for my family without having to put the girls in daycare or leave the house is a blessing. I love writing and I’m excited to see where this journey takes me!
How do you stay productive?? I would love to know your secrets!!