Monday 10 June 2013

Is there enough time in your day?

You know that frustration you feel when there just aren't enough hours in the day? That's where I reside.

I make as much of our food from scratch as I can. This is partly because it's healthier and partly because it's cheaper. This means a lot of time in the kitchen, not just for cooking but clean up too. You can go through a lot of dishes cooking from scratch!

This year I'm expanding the garden I started last year in order to provide us with healthy, tasty, inexpensive food. Planting, weeding, harvesting. Time.

I make a point of being available to the girls after school for at least an hour, whether it's for homework help, talking or even just a snuggle.

I spend much of the day interacting with Little Guy. He has no playmate other than me while the girls are in school. He is able to entertain himself much of the time, but if I leave him to do that for too long he inevitably ends up doing something he shouldn't.

There's the banking and bill paying, menus and grocery shopping.

Then there is the housework. I readily admit that I am not a good housekeeper. I struggle with keeping the clutter under control and usually lose. Cleaning around clutter is time consuming and a pain in the you-know-what. When I feel like I'm winning the battle against clutter and dust, I begin to notice the things it never occurs to me to clean like the door jams, picture frames, and ceiling fan blades.

Do you have any idea how quickly kids grow? I swear that as soon as I finish going through their clothes and pulling out the items that are too small, it needs to be done again.

Which leads me to laundry. For the most part, I manage to stay on top of the laundry. Yet it still takes time. Time to sort and stain treat, time to hang it out to dry, time to fold and time to put it away.

And sleep! I seem to be one of those people who require at least 7-8 hours of sleep a day. Want to guess how often that happens? Come visit me sometime in the land of perpetual fog.

So how do I do it all? Most of the time I don't. The first thing to fall by the wayside is the housework. We have to eat which means I have to cook and clean up the kitchen. The kids need focused time; they are too important to push aside. And we need clean clothes to wear. The housework is left to accumulate and sleep is cut short.

A couple of years ago I finally came to place where I'm okay with this most of the time. I'm an imperfect person doing the best I can. My family is well fed and know that they are a priority. If people come over to visit and the housework isn't done I've stopped making excuses; people who come into my house have come to see me (or the family), not judge the state of my house.

So when you have those days where there just isn't enough time, know you aren't alone. There are others who will admit to being imperfect people and that they too are doing the best they can.