Here’s what I’m thinking about for 2023…

1. Make sure we’ve fun things planned throughout the year. I always feel a bit flat after Christmas and New Year so it helps to have things to look forward to. More meet ups with local friends we haven’t seen in a while and visits to those who live further afield; more weekend day trips, family meet-ups and BBQs are all on the list. Planning a family holiday would also be great!
   
   
2. Stop sweating the small stuff. I may have said this before, but will keep trying

3. Figure out what direction I want to move in career-wise. I made a few changes last year and want to build on this in 2023.

4. Stop being distracted by social media and not be afraid to mute WhatsApp chats from time-to-time! I want to cut screen time. This is especially pertinent in 2023 as my youngest two had mobile phones for Christmas – lead by example!

5. Look for more money-saving and making ideas and shop even smarter to save. My daughters have got more into the saving habit and and are rather excited by the 3.5% interest they’re getting. I’ll be encouraging this further in 2023.

6. Doing something for me. I’m interested in wine so last year embarked on a WSET course to learn more on the subject. It was refreshing to do an activity unrelated to family and work. I’ve now been gifted vouchers to do the second level. I’m really nervous about doing it as I know it’ll require more work and time, but I need to get it booked and enjoy!

7. Try to do something with the children individually. It’s difficult to find the time, but on the occasions I have managed, I’ve seen how much they enjoy the one-on-one time.

8. Couple time. Similarly, it would be nice to have some regular evenings out just with my husband.

9. Stop being afraid to say no if I’ve got too much on and on the flip side says yes to things like playdates more often.

10. Improving my fitness. I’m not very fitness-focussed, though I do like to walk. However, I’d like to set aside an hour a week for a specific training session.

The post 2023: Direction, hobbies and fun appeared first on The Parent Social.

Their increasing self-sufficiency is great in many regards. However, instead of seeing this as an opportunity to focus more on my career, I’m actually feeling the opposite. I now want to spend more time doing things with them as it seems like they’re starting to need me less.

Work is busier than it used to be and it’s bothering me. I miss not being able to take them here, there and everywhere during half terms, and fear that soon my eldest will be too old to want to come out with her younger sisters and me anyway.

I’m lamenting all those times I’ve been with them, but not properly because I was checking an email on my phone or mentally composing one.

Out of balance

I feel work is taking over and I’ve lost some of my family focus. I’ve dropped the ball on a couple of things lately. For instance, thinking the twins were on school dinners one particular day. They weren’t and I sent them in without a packed lunch. My husband said it was an easy thing to do (they chop and change with their lunch plans) and it was the first time it had ever happened. Precisely, I thought, I’d never let that happen before and now I had.

My mind is always darting from one thing to another and I seem to be constantly cramming everything in.

Crossroads

I’m at a real crossroads.

I have huge imposter syndrome, but in this case it’s actually justified. After falling into PR, I feel I’ve bobbed along without ever having a real aptitude. I wake up with work on my mind, it dominates my thoughts in the evening and I’m working longer hours; that naturally impacts how I am as a parent.

I really enjoy meal planning, shopping for ingredients and cooking when I have time. However, during the week it’s much more of a chore than a pleasure as I try to shoehorn it in amongst work. Similarly, I pine for the weekend and when it comes, we do have great family time together, but I spend a lot of time catching up on the stuff I didn’t get done in the week.

Working – what next?

I really feel like I want to climb off for a bit and take the time to enjoy my family more. If I did stop working, would I then end up with too much time on my hands whilst the children are at school? Could I ever go back to work if I did ‘take a break’? Would I really miss making a significant contribution to the family finances? Could I explore other interests? Yes, no, maybe.

What next? Truth is, I really don’t know. I do know that I need to change something.

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It was with a collective sigh of relief that restrictions lifted and the children went back to school on March 8th after the best part of three months at home. Juggling work, homeschool and bandwidth was a pressure on us all.

School life isn’t exactly ‘back to normal’, but it’s a huge, happy step in the right direction.

Restrictions lifted – April 12th

It’s been brilliant having some normality resume and more freedom. We’ve enjoyed alfresco dining, went away for five nights, met outside with a few friends; and it’s been nice to go into non-essential shops again.

Since April 12th, school clubs and external ones have resumed. The children have been so excited. My own weekly exercise group Totally Mama also started back (although I’ve kept up with weekly online poker nights).

Shock to the system

We’ve had many pretty inert weeks and our world got a lot smaller for a period. Then suddenly all activities resumed in unison and it was a bit of a whirlwind. I’m not complaining, but it’s been quite an acceleration in pace: swimming until 7.30pm, early morning netball, kids’ club, gymnastics until 8.30pm and Saturday morning netball…

It’s certainly more hectic again and coupled with renewed social engagements and doing things ‘in real life’ once more it’s requiring a bit of readjustment.

I felt a little guilty for being misty-eyed for the period when I didn’t have to remember lots of timings, have swimming/gymnastics/netball gear to prepare and wash and have to re-schedule dinner times and breakfast to accommodate everything.

Then I was rather reassured by an email I got from my Totally Mama group, which echoed the exact same sentiments. It made me realise that perhaps I’m not alone in finding the 0-60 a little overwhelming.

One of the positives from lockdown was learning to take my foot off the gas a bit when it came to home life, and smell the flowers. I really wanted to continue this, but have realised it’s difficult to maintain as normality resumes.

…..

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Finding Little Things To Celebrate

Post-lockdown wish list

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I’ve worked part-time from home for the last few years and it’s a great set up whilst the girls are at school and creates a good work/life balance. During the six weeks holiday I take a couple of actual weeks holiday where the out of office goes on, and the other four weeks balance out nicely with a combination of work days and fun days.

Working this year

This year has been rather different. I’ve been working on a large scale project. Such was the scale of the project that in the first instance, two week’s holiday was shaved down to nine days. The holiday was great, we had a brilliant time and I would certainly recommend Menorca as a great destination for a family holiday.

When we got back I felt a weight like I’d never felt before when working during the holidays. I knew my husband was going away for work for over two weeks so this was certainly a contributing factor, but this wasn’t the primary reason.

Over the holidays I’ve been working on a project that’s LA-based so there has been an eight hour time difference to contend with. In some senses that was good, we could do activities in the daytime and then I could work into the night. However, there was a flip side… From 4pm onwards I was a bit on tenterhooks knowing that my working day was about to kick off; I felt like I was too focused on packing the kids off to bed so that I could get on. I was working until late and then going to bed feeling wired and tired. The next morning I’d be checking my phone as soon as I opened my eyes to see what I’d missed whilst I was asleep. Breakfast was often quite delayed as I responded to something that had happened overnight, even though the recipient of the email wouldn’t be seeing it for at least six hours.

We’ve been on plenty of excursions: Hampton Court Palace, Tulleys Farm, Birdworld, Littlehampton, Wisley, Garsons to name a few, but this hasn’t stopped me feeling bad.

I feel like I’ve projected my stress too much and not shielded the kids from it enough. Sofia made me breakfast in bed twice whilst Matt was away and all the girls made me cards, which I feel shows that they thought I needed looking after/cheering up. That makes me feel rather guilty.

I don’t feel like the holidays have been the carefree experience of other years; I’m just hoping that the girls don’t view them the same way.

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I love spending lots of time with my children and there are lots of laughs.

Work Life Balance

The work life balance is always a bit of a conundrum. When Sofia was six weeks old I started to work part-time from home. I was intending to start doing this 10 weeks into my maternity leave as statutory maternity pay wasn’t particularly appealing. With no one covering my leave, I felt compelled to check emails and once I started doing this I got involved and then thought that I might as well be paid for my efforts.

Newborns sleep quite a bit, so I was able to get a lot of work done in this time. However, being a new mum, trying to keep some semblance of a tidy house and doing work, was pretty stressful. I was going to mother and baby groups in the morning, rushing home to reply to the most urgent emails, and then rushing back out again for an afternoon activity. Armed with my Blackberry, I was ‘always on’ and constantly waiting for a red blinking light, which signalled another email.

When Sofia was approaching one I was very fortunate to be offered my job back part-time; going into the office two days a week and essentially working from home half a day. I LOVED this set up. For me, this was the perfect work/mum balance. I loved the banter with my old work colleagues and talking about topics other than the children. I even enjoyed the commute as I had an hour of uninterrupted time where I could read a magazine or listen to music. On the three days I wasn’t in the office, I had real quality time with Sofia and spread my half-day working from home across the evenings and nap times.

When the twins came along, I knew that working – even part-time – was no longer viable. I totally immersed myself in motherhood and no longer checked my phone obsessively for emails. It was liberating to not be mentally drafting a work email whilst at a children’s group or planning a press release at a play date. I totally embraced and loved this lifestyle change and really let go.

My working from home pose.

However, the twins are now 22-months, and I have found myself craving something more mentally stimulating to go alongside going to groups, washing, cleaning, cooking and more cleaning. Don’t get me wrong, I love all the fun and laughter we have and I certainly wouldn’t want to work full-time, but I’ve had the feeling that I need an additional challenge and – dare I say it – I’ve been missing work. Blogging has been a great channel since I started writing for TalkMum in November of last year; that inspired me to start this blog in January of this year.

Last week an accommodation company, after speaking to a number of other people, asked me to do its PR. That made me feel good.

Who needs sleep anyway?

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