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Working Moms
BabyNewbury2012
member
How do you all do it?
BabyNewbury2012
member
in Working Moms
I just started back to work this week 
I am finding the evenings go by so fast.
So far we get her from daycare, I cook dinner, Hubby does dishes, I walk my girls (dogs) while hubby bathed her, that was one night then last night we switched lol. Then after she is put to bed, I do bottles, get her bag ready and my lunch for the next day then its time for bed....crazy! lol....
How do you all do it?
This discussion has been closed.
Re: How do you all do it?
Just like this, but without the dog walking:
It's really hard for a while, but it gets easier, I promise! My LO didn't sleep well for 11 months so I would go to bed right when she did. Dishes and laundry would pile up until the weekends. It always helps when the hubbies pitch in.
I have a blog and it isn't about babies or motherhood or my life. It's just about eating, drinking, and traveling: Explore and Eat
Let's see...I pick her up from daycare, we run any errands that need to be run, home by 6, eat dinner (this does not take a long time for us as my husband works late so it's just me and her), play until around 7:45, story time, bath time, asleep usually between 8:30 and 9. Then I clean up bottles, pick up around the house, and then I do whatever floats my boat until bedtime which is usually around 11. I pack her bag in the morning before we leave.
I remember feeling flustered in the beginning (I've been back to work since she was 8 weeks old), but now it's just a comfortable routine. It does get less overwhelming with time, I promise! Good luck!
Meal planning and the slow cooker cause me not to be admitted to the insane asylum. I prep everything for dinner the night before so that when I get home I can just throw the dish in the oven or eat it straight from the slow cooker. I hate the feeling of getting home and having to cook when I'd rather be hanging out with DD and DH. I'll also double the meals and freeze part of it for an easy meal down the road.
DD goes to bed around 9/930 and all the house stuff waits until then. I throw a load of laundry in the wash every other night and throw it in the dryer on the non-washing nights. Doing small loads of laundry is easier for me to get it done. I'm anal about the kitchen being cleaned up every night and the floors being vacummed since we have a dog but everything else slides until I have time.
It's definitely tough at first but you'll get in a groove and things will be easier. Not to say that you won't have those moments when you feel over your head but hopefully they will be few and far between
Very simple....I don't do it all.
My DH works late and it is just me and my girls on weeknights. I actually go home before picking up the girls. I wash all my pump parts and get them in the steralizer. Then I pick them up at 5, get home and depending on when the baby last ate, either nurse her and then feed DD1 and myself or if she ate later I will feed DD1 and myself first. We then play/do activities. I also Around 7 I bathe them, 7:45 we start DD1's bed routine. I try and get her in bed by 8. Then nurse DD2 and put her down...sometimes she doesn't go down easy.
After she goes down I pack up my pump and get my stuff ready for tomorrow. If I have time I sit down and relax before bed. House chores wait until the weekend most of the time.
Goodbye little angel(7/22/2011)....see you in heaven
Goodbye my second angel (9/18/2011)
Ditto all the PP. I stopped doing it all, I meal plan, I use a slow cooker, I make DH help me out with the house more etc.
I felt it was more important to spend what little awake time I could with LO than cook and clean.
You just do. It gets easier as you fine tune the routine too. H and I split stuff so we each get time with K and our house doesn't descend into chaos.
Hi Salt!
House / Baby blog
Once you've been working at your routine for a while, chores will start to go faster, and you'll find shortcuts. Or you'll just find places where you can slack off a bit.
For us, it helps that DH and I have staggered schedules. By the time I get home at 5:15, he's been off work for hours and has already picked DS up from daycare, prepped dinner, and gotten DS's food ready, too. So we sit down to eat, and then either go for a walk or play with DS after dinner. We start bedtime routine at 6:30 and DS is asleep by 7:15. Both DH and I are classic introverts and very dependent on having some quiet downtime in the evenings to recharge, so I usually take some time to write while he watches TV, reads, or plays WoW. After that, we start putting things together for the next day. I try to get in bed by 10:30, but it doesn't always work. Once I can drop my pre-bedtime pumping session, I'll be able to save a lot of time.
Sometimes I sacrifice packing a lunch to get some extra me time. Or the dishes don't get done one night, so whoever has time the next day picks up the slack.
DS is an early riser, so we get some playtime / snuggle time together in the mornings. If we didn't, I would probably rethink putting him to bed so early at night!
LO started day care at 10 weeks and i think for the next two months we came home from work & snuggled. Had a bottle then we would fall asleep on the couch together. Until she was crawling all over the place she only had a bath once a week on the w/e. No need for a nightly bath at this age. Once she was more 'fun' we would stop at the store quickly or something like that then home to play before laying down for bed. Around 6 months she started having dinner at home which was entertaining. Then swim two nights a week afterwork, and sat mornings.
Now that LO is slightly independent at playing I cook dinner quickly while she plays and then we eat together. When she was younger I would purposely put her in the car seat at bed time and then go shopping for food or clothes while she slept. Her bed time has always been 7/730pm.
umm.. I "do it all" but NOT doing it all.
We eat more take-out, the house is NOT sparkling clean, I am constantly behind on laundry.. and I wouldn't have it any other way. I spend all my time with my daughter before she has to go to bed, I relax with my husband after she goes to bed.
Life is pretty good (for as much as I complain sometimes haha)
I have been juggling the daycare and work routine for only a month now. I can say that first week felt like I was on fast forward every night. But it really does get easier once you know who is doing what and when. DH is a lot of help, he cooks dinner, washes bottles and preps the bottles for the next day. So I am with L usually she is napping on me. She comes home exhausted. Tonight she napped for 2 hours, got up, bath and bottle and back to be within 30 min.
I don't clean or do laundry during the week but I do keep the house straightened up.
I know this is unpopular around here, but I have help. A "retired" neighbor comes over four days a week and makes dinner, does the laundry, grocery shops, and straightens up a little. She comes over whenever she feels like it during the day and enjoys doing housework. I pay her $9/hr. It is a win-win for both of us.
I work PT now, but I wish that I had done this earlier when I was still working FT. It would have made my life a lot more enjoyable.
DH helps and if I feel like I need more help, I ask. I am still talking to him about getting a housekeeper every few weeks to do the cleaning. In the meantime, we meal plan so dinner is ready to go each night. If it's not then we are in trouble because there's nothing to eat.
We have set chores to do each night and we get them done. DH takes DD when he gets home and they play a bit with the dog outside so I can finish up dinner and make lunches. DD is in bed by 6:30 so we do bath time and while that is happening the other is doing chores.
I start getting myself ready for bed around 8:30 because I need to shower at night (never thought I'd do this, but it helps with the mornings!!) and pump before bed. I go to bed by 9:30, we get up at 5:30am and I need my sleep. Thankfully DD sleeps through the night most of the time.
I'm new around here, so I didn't realize it was unpopular, but I was going to say the same thing. I couldn't function if we didn't have a cleaning service every other week. On the off weeks, I only spend an hour or so on Saturday (while DS is napping) straightening up. Nightly, DH usually makes dinner, then after DS is asleep I clean up and prep bottles, baby food, and lunches for the next day.
Hey KW!! I love your sig pic! I can't believe how big she is now!
I don't cook during the week. I cook on the weekends for most of the week and DH cooks Wednesday's dinner on Tuesday.
I do the dishes and pack my lunch after DS has gone to bed (7:30 pm). We don't walk our dog every day. DS is 4.5 so no bottles.
Why is this unpopular? It sounds heavenly.
It gets better! I used to be really overwhelmed, but it's gotten so much easier as he's gotten older and started STTN.
I'm a single parent during the week - DH works evenings.
We get home, and I feed DS immediately. I usually give him something easy - leftovers from the night before, or a Gerber toddler meal. (He goes to bed really early, so I don't want to spend our time together cooking). After he eats, he gets a bath, then we play for a bit and I put him to bed.
He goes to bed by 7 at the latest, so I use the rest of the evening to cook dinner for myself and DH, clean up a bit, pack my lunch for the next day, etc.
Not unpopular with me. I totally need to look into this idea.
unpopular?!? Hell, I think you're brilliant!
Seriously, the answer is no one does it all... you just CAN'T keep a perfectly stunning house, take care of your child, work full time, have dinner on the table by 5:30, work out, be bedroom ready for your DH at 9 pm, blah blah blah... Sometimes something has to give. Tonight for me the thing that gave was time with DD... which makes me feel like a parenting failure.. ugh. Most nights I allow the house work to give.