Some of my expectations for this year have just not turned out at all the way I imagined. The biggest on being I imagined I would have more time to blog, now that I only have one little one at home and he attends kinder a couple of times a week.
I spoke briefly about it in my post on Family Life – New Challenges, but bascially this is how this year has panned out in terms of time for blogging (my work):
- I had thought this year with the 3 year old in kinder, I could make that my “work time” and have more nights off the computer. What I have found is some days I need to use some of this time to prepare the evening meal and getting things organised so I have time to help everyone after school.
- On nights when I do work, it is genenarlly closer to 9pm after I have helped everyone as needed before I get onto the computer.
- Weekends now are much busier. Mr I is back playing local footy and the older boys run boundary and scoreboard etc for the Reserves and Seniors, so they are all out off to footy by about 11.00am – after we have already fitted in two soccer games in completely different locations.
- The gap between the Sunday games of footy have widened, so we may have one at 11am and then another at 3pm.
With these changes I have struggled to keep my normal blogging rhythm and I have found it a little stressful. While knowing logically this is our new commitment structure and knowing I am happy for everyone to be doing these things, I was still trying to hold onto my old work plan.
Acceptance
Weekend after weekend was going by and I was not getting even a half the time I had been previously. Unable to meet plan = frustrated me.
When I was putting together my slides for the Time Management webinar (you can see them here) I realised the plan was causing me much unhappiness. It was not possible to meet it and it needed to change. I needed to accept the changes that were going on in our family life and restructure my work around it. One of the fabulous things about blogging and working online is you do have lots of flexibility.
The quote above from George Orwell is so very true! While acceptance hasn’t helped me magic some more hours, it has given me calm. And calm is good!
My New Work Plan
So my new work plan looks like the above. Mr I will most likely laugh hysterically when he sees my finish time of 10.15pm, because I am notorious for working late. I do however want to change that and want to have some wind down time before bed. This will be a big challenge for me.
So from the new work plan, I need to reset my expectations about what I can achieve each day, each week and each month. I will need to set longer completion dates and look to prune off activities online that are not essential or showing a return for the time I am investing.
You can download word document template of my work plan here – My Weekly Plan 2012.
Personal Goals – May Review
| Key Tasks For May | Review May Activity | |
|---|---|---|
| 1. - Blog | Fix outstanding issues with design and update the blog menu planner. | The sign up on the planner is still not working and I have admitted defeat - I cannot fix it. I am looking for someone online to fix the problem for me. |
| 2. - Family | We have found a lovely park to take our dog Lucas to where he can run off the lead and play with other dogs. The kids adore it and I want to make sure we get there at least once a week. | We made it 3 out of 4 weeks. But after two weeks in a row with the dog throwing up in the car, I couldn't do it last week! I need to find a way to fit it in our week, when we can drive straight home (as opposed to pick up from footy training etc), so the poor thing doesn't suffer travel sickness. |
| 3. - Partner | Get along to see Mr I play at least once this month. | I am yet to see a whole game but I have seen snippets. Now I am accepting there will be no work on Saturdays, I am sure we will get along to more games. |
| 4. - Me | Try two new low carb evening meal recipes. | I only tried one, which was a roast quinoa and vegetable curry. I liked it but the kids just wouldn't eat it. More research for me to do on this one. |
Personal Goals – Key Task For June
| Goals for 2012 | Key Tasks For June | |
|---|---|---|
| 1. - Blog | Complete make over of blog. | Find someone to fix menu planner issue. Update menu planner recipes. |
| 2. - Family | Family active time. | Combo of time at the off leash park and at Mr I's football to get us out and active together. |
| 3. - Partner | Doing more things together. | Go out to dinner. |
| 4. - Me | Change the way I eat - more balanced (less carbs). | Try two new low carb evening meal recipes - going to aim for this again. |
How do you find saying no to others? What tips could you share for doing it politely?
13 comments...read them below or add one
Although I’ve tried to put my kids first, my desire to get things done is pretty strong and I’m often frustrated at not being able to complete anything as quickly as I’d like. I think acceptance has got to be one of the hardest things to do if you’re a task driven person like me. In saying that though, I’ve had to ‘give up’ or accept my choice to be with our kids and it certainly has made a big difference to my attitude and outlook.
Sounds very similar to me Lou!
I really need to sit down and make some concrete plans and goals about when and what I will do with my time…
I am terrible at saying no… mostly I think it is because there are so many things I’d like to do and I struggle accepting that I just can’t do them all right now.
For me the kinder run makes life really difficult this year… I drive in and out of town four separate times on some days! But I am working on just accepting it and enjoying my last year at home with my middle boy…
This sounds familiar! Having clear goals has been the best thing for helping me get better at the saying no thing!
It’s so demoralising when the kids won’t eat a new meal you’ve prepared. The new CSIRO Total Wellbeing Diet Fast & Fresh Recipes looks like it might be good for low carb recipes. I’m keen to have a flick-through as I recently borrowed the CSIRO Wellbeing Plan for Kids from the library.
Thanks so much Vanessa for that link. Think I will buy the book!
Wow! Well I’m impressed that you are committing to blog daily, because my goodness you sure are busy. I like the way you have put your plan together and I know how you feel about the evening time, 9:00 til 10:30 goes way too fast
Hi Sandra, I have a plan for the 21 Challenge – wouldn’t be able to do it without it! While it will be a bit of work for a good cause, it will also be good to take me out of my blogging comfort zone.
Goals! Yes! and clarity…I want that too!
Great place to start!
I have a family of fussy eaters, so a lot of my meals are what my kiddies will eat. So I make my meals separately, so I can have a gourmet salad I prepare all the ingredients for my meals n store in containers in the fridge on Sunday’s, eg prep for ceasar salad wraps, hard boiled eggs in one, poached chicken strips in another. This way I eat with everyone n keep healthy because mine are already prepared it just has to be plated.
Thanks for sharing your tips Deidre!
Good to read this, I also thought I’d have more time this year, as twins have gone to school. I do… but I need to use some of that daytime as R & R as life is SO demanding with Paul being away for almost 5 weeks at a time. And I never get to work at night, or rarely, as Teens need me to be on the ball or they stay up all night!! And I need to spend time with them as twins take up most of evenings… just having to be realistic and look at the long game. It’s a particularly demanding year.
Love your meal planning app, by the way! Will be off shopping tomorrow using the menu and shopping list I made for next week.
Our weekends are very full too, I do have a babysitter to help, thank goodness. It was three games of rugby league, canteen duty and a fairy party today. Quieter tomorrow – whew!
Low-carb meals going well here, I just tend to not eat the carbs the kids are having and use extra veggies instead. We had stirfry beef, stirfry veggies and little roast spuds tonight. No spuds for me but laid beef on huge bed of veggies – v good.