We are 5 days into school holidays and I've realized why they can be bad for me! So so bad! Don't get me wrong I love having Joseph home, the biggest perks being I can spend more time with him, I don't need to get up so early for school drop off and my days not cut short with school pickup. However if you are like me and working from home it can be a double edged sword. Here are 5 reasons why school holidays are bad for me, as a stay at home/work from home mum and how I'm fixing it ... - Get all the printables FREE if you are a VIP Lounge Member! Join for only $4.95 per month!
1. ROUTINES OUT OF WACK - School days are very routine with not only my own schedule but also the schedule I have for the kids. On school holidays we quickly forget our routines and things don't get done. Bad, so bad when there are things as simple as brushing teeth in the morning or doing scheduled work.
FIX - My solution for these holidays was to have my KIDS SCHOOL HOLIDAY RULES PRINTABLE & write up a new schedule in my planner for myself.
Printables are FREE for VIP Lounge members!
2. LATE NIGHTS AND SLEEP INS - School nights I'm still working late but I'm in bed at a time that keeps me functioning (usually midnight). Getting out of bed early is horrid, but at the same time I'm up and outside first thing. That fresh air honestly waking me up and giving me a great start to my day. On school holidays my mind thinks I can just keep working as late as I wish (often until 2am ), because I don't HAVE to get up so early. However me sleeping and not having to be anywhere at a certain time completely slows me down. Next thing you know I'm still trying to wake up with a shower after I've just put Miss 1 down for her nap at 11:30 and half my days gone without a work or house duty thing done! The rest of my day is spent with the kids & husband having quality family time. (And whilst that's great, I'm still letting other important things down).
FIX - Keep your sleeping patterns the same as school days (do as you normally do with weekends) I found my biggest problem being that time went by without me realising it! So now I set a bedtime alarm half an hour before I should be in bed to get myself off my work computer (or off Skype to my entrapenarual friend) and settled in. A great tool to use if you have a iPhone, is the bed time section of the clock app. You can put in what time you want to wake up, how many hours of sleep you want (adults recommend 7-8) and an alarm to go off 15-60 minutes before you should go to bed. You can also set this for certain days eg work days.
3. MEAL PLANNING GOING WAYWARD (is that even word?) - If you have seen my You Tube vlogs you will know I'm big on meal planning and I would like to say pretty great at it. I'll admit though during the school holidays it can be missing in action some days. Mostly because I've been in a rush to fit in grocery shopping with the kids or I just haven't planned well enough with the holiday activities we have planned. In turn extra money is spent without a proper budget stuck to .
FIX - There are a few solutions I have found worked ... (if you don't know what meal planning is check out this blog post and get a free printable)
- Do meal planning for the entire holidays a week before they start - making sure you know exactly what is planned for each day. See meal planning printable pack I use and get the free printable to get you started)
- Don't only plan your dinner meals but all meals and snacks for the kids at home too. You can even still pack a lunch box for your kids during the holidays! Great for if your going out of the house as it stops impulse 'I'm hungry mum' buying unnecessarily.
- Plan meals that can be flexible to move/swap out into different days if plans change.
- Use THE GROCERY CALCULATOR that way you spend less time writing your shopping list once you have your week items set up - and you can add things through your week. (Your able to put 3 different supermarkets into my grocery calculator at once) it's also fantastic to keep to a budget and stop impulse buying.
- Do online shopping if you shop at somewhere like Coles that has click and collect or delivery. Do the same as the grocery calculator and add things through the week to save time. Ordering online will also save you 1-2 hours of actually going into a store and will help you stick to a budget and avoid impulse buys.
4. BORED (and some times annoying) KIDS 'MUM, MUM, MUUUUMMM. I'M BORED' - Nothing worse than having bored kids that don't know what to do with themselves when you need to get you're work and home duties done during a particular time. I always felt bad that I wasn't more organised to make everyone's life more simple. I would get side tracked from what I was doing just to then attend to a bored child that shouldn't actually be bored!
FIX - I implemented the SCHOOL HOLIDAY RULES PRINTABLE and also the SCHOOL HOLIDAY CALENDAR PLANNER No more bored kids not knowing what to do! Especially when they could see what was planned for the entire holidays and then had things to look forward to. Try this simple 2pk School Holiday Rules + School Holidays Calendar Planner - 50% OFF use code HOLIDAY50 on checkout!
Printables are FREE for VIP Lounge members!
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5. NO MONEY TO ACTUALLY DO ANYTHING - The school holidays are not a surprise . Dates can be found 2 years in advance online for most countries, yet somehow we would get to that time and not have enough to do EVERYTHING we wanted . Disappointed little faces all round!
FIX - Again my solution was planning ahead with the SCHOOL HOLIDAY CALENDAR PRINTABLE. And putting money aside each week for the activities .
Can you relate to these 'bad things about holidays' ? Do you have your own bad things that happen as a mum? Comment below