As some of you may know, I am the mother to two young children. My oldest just turned 5 in April and my youngest is 15 months old. When my first daughter was born I left my full time radio career to stay home. Eventually, I embarked upon a writing career and I am currently in love with my job. My only regret is that I didn't do something in the writing realm sooner.
Anyway, since I spend every minute possible with my girls, the time to write is not always forthcoming. I have had to carve that time out with care. My writing takes place only when both girls are asleep. I worked hard to coordinate their naps so that they would need to nap at about the same time every afternoon. This worked beautifully to give me an hour or so alone a day to write.
I have a lot to do in that hour. I am a freelance writer and have regular assignments from a number of clients. I am an author with two books under contract undergoing editing. I like to keep this blog updated weekly. I often do interviews for other blogs and so on and so forth. That hour is precious to me and essential to keep my career going.
As I mentioned, my older daughter is 5 and she doesn't really need a nap anymore. She is SUPER good about going to her room for her "nap" and she never complains about that aspect. However, she doesn't really nap anymore. She finds ways to entertain herself and she leaves me alone so we're both happy.
Recently, though, she has found a few too many ways to entertain herself. Case in point...the other day I went upstairs to get my younger daughter when she arose from her nap and I found my bedroom essentially teepeed. My older daughter had strung five ace bandages from various windows and doors over to the bed and she had hung bras, underwear, socks, and anything else she found from them. My jaw dropped.
And even more recently, she dragged every laundry basket we had in the house to her room and built a dirty laundry tower in her closet...I'm not kidding the thing was almost as tall as me. I know that was my fault for not having done laundry in a while, but still. My jaw dropped even farther when I saw that one because it took me a while to figure out what she'd done.
How I don't notice her doing these things while she's actually doing them, I don't know. I guess the writing sucks me in. It's just an example of one of the sacrifices I make as a writer. My daughter "naps" nicely and doesn't complain...I get my writing done and feel refreshed and ready to play for another numerous amount of hours. But I have a lot of clean up work to enjoy because of it!
She'll be in kindergarten in the fall so we only have a few more months to limp through in order to get to a point where I don't have to force a "nap" on her and she won't have to redecorate anything anymore. Someday she'll understand and laugh at the things she did. I get to laugh at them now! On that note, I better go see what she's done today...
Anyway, since I spend every minute possible with my girls, the time to write is not always forthcoming. I have had to carve that time out with care. My writing takes place only when both girls are asleep. I worked hard to coordinate their naps so that they would need to nap at about the same time every afternoon. This worked beautifully to give me an hour or so alone a day to write.
I have a lot to do in that hour. I am a freelance writer and have regular assignments from a number of clients. I am an author with two books under contract undergoing editing. I like to keep this blog updated weekly. I often do interviews for other blogs and so on and so forth. That hour is precious to me and essential to keep my career going.
As I mentioned, my older daughter is 5 and she doesn't really need a nap anymore. She is SUPER good about going to her room for her "nap" and she never complains about that aspect. However, she doesn't really nap anymore. She finds ways to entertain herself and she leaves me alone so we're both happy.
Recently, though, she has found a few too many ways to entertain herself. Case in point...the other day I went upstairs to get my younger daughter when she arose from her nap and I found my bedroom essentially teepeed. My older daughter had strung five ace bandages from various windows and doors over to the bed and she had hung bras, underwear, socks, and anything else she found from them. My jaw dropped.
And even more recently, she dragged every laundry basket we had in the house to her room and built a dirty laundry tower in her closet...I'm not kidding the thing was almost as tall as me. I know that was my fault for not having done laundry in a while, but still. My jaw dropped even farther when I saw that one because it took me a while to figure out what she'd done.
How I don't notice her doing these things while she's actually doing them, I don't know. I guess the writing sucks me in. It's just an example of one of the sacrifices I make as a writer. My daughter "naps" nicely and doesn't complain...I get my writing done and feel refreshed and ready to play for another numerous amount of hours. But I have a lot of clean up work to enjoy because of it!
She'll be in kindergarten in the fall so we only have a few more months to limp through in order to get to a point where I don't have to force a "nap" on her and she won't have to redecorate anything anymore. Someday she'll understand and laugh at the things she did. I get to laugh at them now! On that note, I better go see what she's done today...
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