Tuesday, November 01, 2005

Setting a schedule

I never used to keep a schedule and I am still having troubles with keeping one. The thing I like about working at home is the freedom to work when I want and take care of housework and kids around it. I have found that I don't get much done this way though. Last week I sat down to work and then realized my house was just a mess. I couldn't really focus on the work because I kept looking around the house.
You have to find a happy medium. I don't feel very qualified to give any advice in this area since I am so bad at practicing it but I think the secret is to have a plan. First you need to know what your goals are and make a plan of what you need to do to reach those goals. Second figure out everything you need to accomplish everyday, laundry, dishes, feeding and dressing kids, playtime, etc. Then you can set up a monthly or weekly schedule of things that get done everyday. For instance I know that everyday I need to feed, bathe and dress kids, I know that I need to take pics for ebay listings and get those listings posted. I know that I need to promote my website and add content to it. I know that I need to take surveys and cook dinner.
So for me first thing in the morning is feeding and dressing kids, while they are eating I pick up the house and start the laundry, while they are bathing I can check my email for surveys and get those out of the way. Then we can have playtime. After playtime there is lunch and while they are eating I take pictures. Once lunch is done there is tv time. During that time I can answer emails, post surveys and promote the website. After tv time is preschool, once she is at school I know I have a few hours of uninterrupted time, that is when I get things done that take a lot of focus like writing content for the website and posting ebay listings. After school I don't get much done workwise until after dinner and bedtime. Then I can again work on things that take a lot of focus or just take some time for myself. I usually use this time for more website promotion though. As you can see my schedule needs a lot of work to keep me better focused but the point was to give you some idea of the things that you need to fit into your schedule so hopefully you can do a better job of scheduling than I do!

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