My days as a full time stay at home lady of leisure slave to my offspring mother are numbered.
And that number is 4.
This Friday, I am going back to work. I am stepping up to the plate, and taking a more active role in the company my husband and I run, Skysoclear. I am a bit nervous, because I am not used to this work malarky. The last proper job I had ended in 2008 when I had my daughter and until recently, we hadn’t needed for me to look back.
But now my husband needs to concentrate more on securing work and actually getting it done, rather than faffing about with invoices and spreadsheets and calls from the bank, so he’s handed it over to me. Along with a bit of marketing, social networking and the odd blog post and newsletter.
I am very excited, and very very nervous. I am going to have to learn our business, and be disciplined enough to get stuff done. I don’t know what I am going to do with our son whilst I am meant to be actually doing this work, but I am hopeful that it will all work itself out one way or another. So this Friday, I’ll be going to my craft group, as normal, but this time I’ll be armed with my laptop, instead of my crochet, and a list from the task master.
Holy crap.
(If any of you wonderful people have any tips on juggling working with parenting, then send them my way, Alice Harold, I am specifically looking at YOU!)
Wow, good luck! It’s always a big step, that first rung of the ladder….and is usually accompanied by a large dollop of guilt, stress and self-doubt. Or maybe that’s just me! Do you have a room/office just for work (and child-free)?
I am likely to be going back soon too (2 weeks) although I only gave it all up in July, but it is a new role and always a bit nerve-wracking.
Hope it all goes smoothly for you!
Sx
Thank you so much for your lovely comment! We have an office that I am hoping to go to once a week, and then work from a coffee shop (where a lot of my friends will be) on a Friday morning. My son will have to come with me for the time being, but I am going to try and work around his naps as we can’t afford childcare for him. God knows how this is going to pan out, a couple of friends have offered to help out and I may take up an offer of shared childcare with a friend in the same sort of situation. I figured that I can tweet and network from my iPad and anything that needs my laptop will have to be done from the office or from home.
I tend to go a bit stir crazy being at home all the time, so I think this will be good for me. It will certainly be easier once my daughter starts school in September, but that is a looooong old time away.
I hope your return to work goes well for you too x
HAHAH! I was just about to congratulate you on joining the ‘having it all’ club… hope it doesn’t send you too mental ;)
My advice would be to try and get houseworky stuff done when the kids are awake, and try and turn that into a game rather than saving it for nap time (which is prime work time now!). Elfie looooves helping me with the laundry and we both do it in front of CBeebies. Also try to put to one side the internet activities you like to do that can take up a lot of time; I’m quite militant about when I blog now and will only do it from the iMac rather than off a laptop when I could be working. Same with blog reading: I now do this in bed at night on the iPad rather than waste precious working time.
Also, accept any offers of free childcare that come along, don’t overload yourself with extra-kiddy activities until you see how hectic your workload is and LISTS! I love lists. With little ticky boxes ;)
Good on you lovely! The thing I love best about going back to work is getting my brain in gear for something other than motherhood. The worst thing is the guilt you feel spending time away from them and not giving them your full attention. I love the advice on housework whilst they are awake and nap time is definitely prime work opportunity! Best of luck xx
Good luck with getting into the swing of things, am sure it will go really well and how rewarding working in the family business building a future together rather than lining someone elses pockets :) No skiving off blogging in your working hours missus! x
I have 2 words: nap-time and evenings! Prepare to be twittered to within an inch of your life every night until 1am (more if Mammasaurus is out there!)
Thats cool, no doubt I could do with the company x
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Hope it went OK? Just be disciplined, particularly around social media – don’t let it take over your life…it’s trying to take over mine! And grab the time while you can. I read blogs whenever I can when we are on the move with the iPad, in fact doing so in the bath now! And remember Softplays are your friend as the kids get older!
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