Creating a work from home schedule can really encourage and promote focus and productivity. No matter how many distractions (aka kids) you have crawling around your feet and swinging from the chandeliers.
I wanted to share with you my current daily schedule then thought it’d be fun to show you how it looked about six years ago.
Mostly because, when I reflect on how prolific I was with not only my blog posts back then, but also with my content creation, product creation, coaching training, self-care practices, hobby farming AND homeschooling – I kinda wanna give myself a massive, yet gentle, pat on the back.
{Sidenote: Those hug/back slap combos? Not my fave way to be greeted.}
One of the reasons I was able to complete so much during those busy, yet blissful, early years, was because of a habit I picked up while I was homeschooling my daughter Edie for three years.
We were following a beautifully laid-out Waldorf-based curriculum, which encouraged us to write out our daily schedule. So I nerdily did so and it totally kept my momentum flowing. Not only in the homeschooling areana – but also in everything else I wanted to achieve each day as a hyper-creative, entrepreneurial, cow-loving mama.
Residue of this initially planned out daily schedule can still be sniffed out today.
And you can see so for yourself when you sign up to check out not only my current work from home daily schedule but also the rough outline of the one I followed in my kids’ peak cute years – When Edie was getting homeschooled and Kale was just sitting there like a lump being the cutest, hugest, happiest baby in the backwoods.
Okay, twist my rubber, clucky mama arm. Here’s a visual from those days.
Also included in today’s bonus content is a blank schedule for you to print out and fill in, over and over again. Because these daily schedules aren’t meant to be written in stone (obs). And what a sweet little walk down memory lane.
As you fill in this blank schedule I want you to consider some basic tenants so that adhering to it is more likely and you’re not hard on yourself if doesn’t feel great right away.
Do what comes naturally
Lean on what’s realistically going to work for your unique family. When I look back at our salad years schedule (called so because they were truly idylic and blissful with the cow thing, cute kids, plus, we grew alot of lettuce in our huge garden at the time) and a part of me thinks. Wow. Crazy that my kids always slept in so long.
But it’s true. They were sleeper in-ers (and continue to be) which I know is super not the norm.
So accept and surrender with what is real for you. Rooster kids up at the crack of dawn? SO common with my own friends and clients. If that’s you, I trust you’re blessed in other ways.
Celebrate that your mom lives next door and would LOVE some grandkid time while you get an hour of work down. Or the fact that your kids never catch a cold. Or they fall asleep early.
And on that note, this isn’t meant to be a schedule to be followed every single day. Maybe you only work one, two or three days a week now. Maybe some days you get a whole day to yourself if you co-parent or have a cool daycare or other childcare situation set up.
Be flexible and creative and stay filled to the brim with gratitude. Because no matter what, as soon as you get comfortable, the whole shebang will change before you know it.
Begin with Your Times of Supreme Consciousness
I wake up no problem crazy early (and according to daily schedule past – looks like that’s always been the case) so I can get some alone, quiet time to check my email, read up on news and newsletters I get from my fave online peeps. But I have to get to bed early-ish to make that happen.
I know a few things about myself.
First, I’m a morning bird all the way. I’m not a night owl by any stretch of the imagination (but I plan on staying up until 2:00 am this Saturday because Prince Harry and Megan Markle’s wedding!). And, I rarely schedule or do any sort of work after 2:30 which is the time I get the kids from school.
Know thyself. But especially thy circadian rhythms.
Balance out the times of apart and times of togetherness
There is a concept in Waldorf schooling, Ashtanga yoga, dancing, breathing-essentially everything that’s awesome- 0f expansion and contraction. Inbreath and outbreath. Lattes and wine (kidding!).
Creating then looking at the pdf of my schedules during my kids’ prime cute years when we did everything at home and compare it to today, I intentionally made it so that the times when we come back together to relax, just be, we share one table cell on the schedule chart.
Aim to merge cells every few hours.
Ways to do that is to make consistent mealtimes. Create rituals that are rarely skipped such as a family cuddle on the bed or couch before dinner preparations or a walk after breakfast.
And in pinch, you can include daily household chores as a shared inbreath together but get creative to make it fun (90’s hip hop makes it more entertaining for the kids as mama busts a move).
Consciously Choose Your Ideal Amount of Work Hours a Week
For some reason, it helped me to consider the amount of hours that make up a part-time job when I was deciding how many hours I wanted to aim for as my weekly work from home hours.
While in the early years I was typically able to crank out four hours of day of work, there is this thing called life that happens. And that was okay. Some days, that schedule was followed to a tee – and I was doing an internal happy dance whenever that happened. But other days, stuff came up and more cuddle time was called for, a trip into town, a family adventure. And a different sort of internal happy move was busted.
And with all on my plate back then with the kids and farm, an 8 hour a week part-time job was totally reasonable (and it felt really good that what I was up to in that totally exotic bird that was online biz back then, the pay was waaaaay beyond minimum wage).
But now the kids are at school, I typically can get this schedule happen four days out of the week.
Life still happens but I have way more wiggle room to compensate. I notice too that I rarely work beyond 20 hours a week which is what I wanted to top myself off at anyway.
Pepper Your Schedule with Self-Care
I like to lean on my handy dandy SHOES system to check in with my self-care needs.
S is for sleep – So I make sure I’m getting in bed early and my daily schedule reflects that.
H is for H2O – I keep water upstairs so when I go upstairs I chug. Plus, there’s water in this latte beside me here, right?
O is for Organic Living – For me, that means eating good, unprocessed foods and my cooking time always scheduled at 4:00 is balm for my soul. Love cooking!
E is for Exercise – This falls under the ‘know thyself’ umbrella. I know I can’t go to any kind of workout in the morning. During the day I just get irritated because I rather be working while my brain is still functional so I wait until after dinner. I do take the pup for a walk before lunch to get a little movement in and my butt doesn’t get too flat.
S is for Stillness – This is reflected in my schedule with waking up before the kids. This can look like meditation for you. Or a ritual of just cuddling with the kids when you reunite after a fun day – for both of you!
Other than that, there are no rules
And what I just listed up there aren’t even rules. Just guidelines and encouragement to try it out. Just remember to tweak on a regular basis and see what works for you.
This one of the many reasons why the entrepreneurial path is such a spritual growth boot camp. It takes discipline and stretching out of your comfort levels sometimes. But more importantly, you get to observe where you thrive and how you rectify what’s not serving you any more – or never has.
Okay, maybe just one rule…
Have fun!
This is probably the best part of being your own boss. No one gets to tell you what to do and when.
Except maybe yourself. And your kids. But beyond that, try different schedules like you’re playing dress up. Again, just like yoga, find that balance between staying true to the structures you create to see you progress toward your goals but also breathing into the flexibility this sweet little life decision of becoming an entrepreneur affords you.
If you haven’t done so yet, drop your name and email below to grab your sample schedules and your template to fill in:
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