Today is my first day of stay-at-home motherhood.
Yes, I have a few social media clients (ask about me) and I’ll still be blogging and school starts back up in January, but for the most part? I’m the full time caregiver for the foreseeable future. We have no nanny, no babysitter (yet) so if I need to go somewhere, I’m packing ’em up and taking them with me. Oh boy.
I’m a little nervous and I am wondering how in the heck am I going to get everything done? The laundry, cooking three times a day instead of once, blog posts, homework, baths, storytime, crafts, trips to the library, social media maintenance for my clients…I want to curl up in the bed just thinking about it.
I figure this week will have a severe learning curve, as I’ve never been a woman who just does one thing, even if that “one thing” is spending time with the two little people I love most. It will be hard for me to just sit and be with my kids. I need structure, probably more than they do, so at the end of the day I can feel like I’ve accomplished something. Here’s my schedule so far (and yes, I am aware that it might be totally unrealistic but here’s our starting point):
8:00 Start the day with breakfast and stories.
8:30 Clean the kitchen, living room while NickJr. plays babysitter (don’t judge me)
9:00 Hit the library for story and play time
10:30 Play time – Mama starts making lunch
Noon – 2:00 NAPTIME!!! (Yes, my kids still take two-hour naps. Hallelujah!)
2:00 – Arts and crafts time (Today we’re making gingerbread houses)
3:00 – Cleaning up and NickJr plays babysitter once more (sue me, alright?)
4:00 Start making dinner
5:00 Hubby comes home – We eat dinner
Then it’s the whole bedtime routine and the struggle to keep the kids IN the bed once we put them there.
Then I’m supposed to go to sleep and do it all over again the next day. And the next. I didn’t put in there when I was supposed to get work done. I guess that’s what the weekend is for, huh?
Any of my readers stay at home moms? Any advice for me?
I’m not a stay at home mommy but that schedule looks fine to me. During my periods of unemployment, I always found it helpful to have a simple weekly schedule when I stayed home with my son. It allowed me to keep things interesting and gave me a reason to leave out the house.
Honey… no one here should judge you because you have TV time scheduled in there. That’s good downtime, man. I’m rooting for ya… Judging by my weekends, I know it must be super hard to get things down while little ones are around and need/want your undivided attention all. the. time.
Like you, I need a lot of structure too. And just like you, probably more than my son needs it. So we usually have a schedule for our weekends and ummm, nap time is in there as well (2 hours in my house too!).
Cherish those nap times, lady. Because you’ll be so exhausted at the end of each day if you don’t. Not to mention, the kids will be cranky. Even if my son doesn’t want to take a nap, he still has to. And the rule is if he doesn’t want to sleep, he still has to stay in his room and bed for the two hours. Call me mean mommy, but we BOTH need the break.
Good luck hun! It’ll be rocky at first, but you’ll be fabulous!
.-= Alicia @Mommy Delicious´s last blog ..The Winner Takes All – Build-A-Bear Workshop and Shutterfly Winners! =-.
The schedule looks good to me! Sounds fun and relatively stress free (hopefully).
Love that the kids still have naps AND a bedtime – you know Im a huge advocate of that kind of routine.
Blog time you can fit in once the kids are down for the night. That’s what I do – both boys in bed by 7, after which time I cook dinner and do light cleaning (okay, fine, “straightening”) and then I get online and catch up on blog stuff.
Being a stay at home for almost 2 years now naturally I love this post, and sorry girl but I kind of laughed out loud when you mentioned a schedule. I live by schedules and one thing I know is that it’s super hard to keep a schedule when you have little ones. Most days I wing it and I have school to worry about myself on top of cleaning, keeping my son occupied and cooking, doing the laundry etc. etc. The best advice I can give is to pace yourself, most importantly don’t freak out if your schedule blows up in your face it can be very frustrating and to be honest I don’t think we ever really get everything sorted out on our lists it’s a working progress but it’s doable I can tell you that. Good luck.
I’ve been a stay-at-home mom going on three years now and I love it. Naptime is going to the time during which you can load the dishwasher, do some laundry, get dinner started & have some free time. Utilize those naptimes well. I try give Moo tasks to do so that she will feel like she is helping out around the house. She loves it.
Blogging helps me to keep my sanity too. I’m with a two year most of the day and it helps to have some adult place my mind can go to vent. I’ve also used Meetup.com to find some playgroups that we have joined. This way we don’t end up staying in the house all week. She can get out and interact with other kids her age and I interact with some other moms.
Just remember it’s all about finding balance not so much a schedule.
.-= YUMMommy´s last blog ..25- A Start of New Adventures =-.
hats off to you chica
You’ll do an amazing job and i’m sure your kids will enjoy every single minute of it! Best of luck to you this week and i hope you and your family have a very MERRY CHRISTMAS 
I think having the schedule is a good thing. I have one an even though it probably only works that way one day out of a whole week, it gives me a little structure. Just don’t beat yourself up the days that it doesn’t look anything like the one you planned.
i love your schedule thats soo my day on paper including nick jr.!!!!! sad but true!!!!!
@Rachel’s Mommy – You gotta have that Nick Jr time in there. Wonder Pets and the Backyardigans save me from the edge sometimes and I’m not ashamed to admit it!
I am a stay at home mom! The best advice I can give: don’t sweat the small stuff. Yes, it’s so nice having a clean house and home cooked meals every meal of the day, but sometimes life happens and our little ones are a little needy! So don’t feel bad if you feel like you didn’t accomplish “Everything” you wanted. Happy kids = a happy healthy home, not necessarily a super clean one hehe <3
I'm excited to read about your adventures!
.-= jess; [the bottle chronicles]´s last blog ..Pictures of Our Christmas Festivities =-.