A Mom’s Dilemma: Finding Time To Work From Home

From the time the kids wake up in the morning to the time they go to bed, they want Mom!  Non-Stop!  But Mom has some good ideas on how to make some extra money by working from home.  How do you balance family and business?  Answer:  Carefully.

For those of you Moms that have babies or young toddlers not yet in school, time can be a very difficult task to manage, especially if the time is for you.  This juggling act between family and business will mean that you need to be very creative in your approach.  Below are three suggestions to try to help you organize your time so that you can try to get (or start) some of your business activities.

1.  Hire Your Kids!

That’s right, you read that correctly, hire your child.  I don’t mean that you are actually going to include him as an employee on your schedule C, do it as a game.  You need to find time, and if pretending that your son or daughter is an employee of your company doing small tasks will keep them occupied, then everyone wins.

Make them feel useful.  If you have a small work area and desk, give them one too!  Give them some crayons, markers, paper, etc. and ask them to draw some pictures for you to hang in your home office.  Tell them that every office needs decorations, and you are hiring them as little artists to customize your office space.  Most children love doing arts-and-crafts and best of all, their occupied and where you can watch them.  Be creative and come up with different projects throughout the week, and if you’re lucky, you’ll be able to get 30-60 minutes a day to catch-up on e-mails or phone calls.

2.  Nap Time Is Your Time

Most young children sleep about 1-2 hours-a-day as naps (if they’re younger and you’re lucky, maybe more).  Whatever time they give you, take it and make the most of it.  This time is great for important phone conversations where you don’t want to be interrupted every two seconds, or for composing important documents.  Web development and research can be done during this time too since they usually require longer work times.

If you’re a Stay at Home Mom, then you probably can’t be doing this everyday since you’ll have other normal day-to-day tasks to handle, but try to do it several days a week and keep to a schedule.  This way you’ll get into habits of doing certain projects on specific days which will help you gauge progress.

3.  Time Away From Mommy

Mommies need breaks from being Mommies so that they can spend time building their business.  Remember, you’re doing this for your family, so don’t feel that you’re being a bad Mom by taking a day (or at least a few hours) for yourself!  Every 2-3 weeks, try to get a day to yourself to work.

See if you can have a family member take your child(ren) for the day or for a few hours so that you can work on your business activities.  Grandparents and close relatives are good choices.  Also, consider swapping days with a relative or close friend who has children.  One week they’ll watch your children, and another week, you’ll watch theirs.  It may not be the best scenario, but it will at least give you the occasional time to get something done.

Remember, there are many ways to make time, but try to find a good balance between your family and your business.  Your children are your priority and they’re only young once.  Don’t get too carried away with running your business that you forget to enjoy those precious moments with your children.