Changing My Plans

I published a post on my personal blog this morning regarding the big news that's taken almost a week to sink into my brain. You can read about me finding out I'm pregnant by clicking here. I don't want to rehash all of that information, but I did want to take a few minutes and blog about what I believe this means for my business. This is as much for other work from home moms as it is for me.

To say this news came as a surprise would be an understatement. This news came as a major shock. Quite honestly, I wasn't expecting to have any more children. I was expecting to bring up the three children I already have, while building my business. My youngest started preschool this year, and having those hours at home during the day to work has been wonderful. It's so quiet here while the kids are in school, and I've been able to increase my income quite a bit.

When I went to my appointment last week, I was expecting to discuss sterilization with my nurse practitioner. However, that conversation had to be put on hold for a little while after I found out I was pregnant that morning. When I got home, of course I couldn't really talk about it with anyone, because I hadn't told my husband yet. I spent the day thinking about how life would be once the baby was born. When Caleb was a toddler, I was able to get some work done during the day, but, especially during the beginning I only really worked while he was napping. As he got older and was able to entertain himself a little more, I did a little bit of work while he was awake.

The idea of changing my plans wasn't appealing to me at first. However, I was reminded by God that my first job is to be a Mom. He commissioned me to do that work above any other work. My writing skills are still going to be there once this child starts preschool. Until that time, I will follow God's plan for my life. Right now, that plan involves me having one more baby to raise. I must be kind of good at it if God keeps entrusting all of these children to my care.

We are truly blessed, and this will be a wonderful experience. I'm looking forward to welcoming a new Colwell into our family.

Have you ever been in a similar situation with a surprise pregnancy?

Establishing A Routine

I'm finding that one of the most difficult things has been establishing a new routine. I'm not sure why that is. I've had to do it many times over the past year and a half. Even before that, when I worked outside the home, I had to constantly put new routines in place when my kids had a milestone, or when I started a new job.

It's been almost a month since the kids started going back to school. I will admit that the first day of school was a little bit crazy. It didn't help that I made a major boo-boo and didn't realize that my three-year-old was supposed to start school on the same day as his brother and sister. In my defense, the school calendar never got changed, and pre-school was supposed to begin on the following Monday. I couldn't help but wonder why no one stopped me when I dropped the other two kids off at school, visited for a few minutes with Caleb, and then left to drive back home from Horseheads. Imagine my surprise when I was sitting here, working, about an hour later, only to get this phone call from Caleb's teacher:

Miss Emma: Nicole?

Nicole: Yes?

Miss Emma: Ummm...we were just wondering if Caleb was coming to school today? 

Nicole: Uhh...Caleb doesn't start school today. I thought preschool started on Monday. 

Miss Emma: No...I'm...pretty sure it starts today. 

Oh. My. Gosh.

I quickly made his lunch, and put some decent clothes on him before dragging him out the door for yet, another trip to the school.

It's been an interesting time.

Since that day, I've enjoyed weekdays filled with silence in my home. It's wonderful to just sit here with nothing but the clickety-clack of my keyboard to fill the air. I love it. It's amazing how much work you can get done when you're not running around after a toddler, or when you don't constantly have to change dirty diapers.

I'm really loving my job these days, I just really need to work on getting that routine down. Getting up earlier seems to be the key to success, but it's not always easy to get up at 5 am. I'm going to try to do it again tomorrow though.

I think where I run into difficulty is when I think of how I used to work before. When you have kids at home, and you work from home, you basically try to fit work in whenever you can. When it was just me and my three-year-old at home all day, I would play with him and write a post, then play with him a little more, then write a post. Now, I feel a little bit lost. Even though today was a really good, productive day.

I'm going to keep working on my work schedule. I know I'll eventually find a way that works for me.

If you work at home, what are some things you do to keep yourself on task? Do you have a regular schedule that you follow?

The New School

My children have mixed feelings about me right now. Most of them like me, but one of them doesn't like me that much. It's OK. I know she'll get over it.

My husband and I made a big decision this year. We decided (for a variety of reasons) to send our children to a Christian school instead of keeping them in the public school system. We made this decision for a lot of reasons, and each child has a supporting reason for benefiting from a Christian school.

My three-year-old is a genius. He's really smart for his age, and we wanted to get him into some type of preschool program. We considered Head Start, but then we decided to look into a new school that was opening up in Horseheads, New York. Foundations Christian School. He's really excited about starting school like his big brothers and his big sister. He likes me.

My ten-year-old is going into the sixth grade this year. He has had a problem with getting bullied in school for the past few years. I'm not sure what it is, but many of the boys in his class picked on him, and he got his glasses broken more than once by mean kids in school. As a result of the bullying, most of his friends in school are girls, which is OK, but we want him to have friends who are boys. He's really happy about the new school, and he likes me too.

My daughter is the one who isn't really thrilled with me.

She is thirteen (almost fourteen), and she'll be in ninth grade. She will be the only ninth grader in the new school. This has her pretty upset, as you can imagine. Her social life is very important to her, and it's bothering her that she won't have that as much at her new school. Her friends from middle school look really attractive to her right now, however I'm remembering the drama she went through every day when "Sarah" wasn't speaking to "Emma" and "Sarah" expected my daughter to take her side when she just wanted to be friends with both of them. It was a big mess. I'm also thinking about all of the bad choices and behaviors we had to correct last year. There were many of them.

So, she doesn't really like me much right now. However, my husband and I have given this a lot of thought, and we both feel that this is really the best thing for our family. We're trusting in God to provide us with the finances we need to make it happen, and I'm confident that it will be a great thing for all three of my children.

I do know that it will be very...different in my house while my kids are all in school all day long. Even so, it will be a great time for me to really dig into my writing. With so many interesting projects coming up, I can't wait to see what's in store for me when September gets here!

One Of Those Days...

Today has been a great day. Really. I'm not being sarcastic at all. It has been a very productive day for me, which I know is rare, especially since I know these children, and I'm fully aware of what they're capable of. 

It started off with my husband getting called in to drive a truck today instead of doing his sales job. That resulted in a 5:45 wake up call for me to make his sandwiches so that he would have some good food to eat today while he was working so hard for our family. Next, I started writing, almost immediately after I finished my breakfast. With one blog post down, I felt like I could take a deep breath and get my workout in. 

Yes. I work out. Every day, for at least half an hour. 

Half an hour on my gazelle, and 20 crunches on the old exercise ball (which is actually brand new), and I was ready to get into it again. 

Lucky for me, there's this area of my house where I can retreat to and write. It's not so great in the winter because there's no heat back here. But in the summertime, it's not too bad as long as I have the fan blowing directly on me. I proceeded to knock out nine more blog posts, complete a job for a new customer, and do my last monthly article for one of my favorite clients. Then, of course, I came here to tell you all about my productive day. 

This day was not met without a few challenges. My daughter interrupted me to ask about hanging out with a friend today, and then my youngest decided (again) that he didn't wan to take a nap. Of course, he is now passed out on the couch. I think that what made this day different from some of my "other" work days is the fact that I just came back here and got right back into working again. I didn't let anything distract me for too long, and those things that did distract me (like uploading some pictures of my three-year-old onto Facebook) were only given a brief chance to distract me. 

Yes, it's been one of those days. 

Now, it's 4:30 in the afternoon, and I have a few loose ends I'd like to tie up before it's time to get dinner in the oven.

Working at home is one of the best parts of what I do. I love being here with my kids, and being able to take breaks whenever I want to. I love the fact that I can work around my kids' schedules and text my husband at will. It's definitely a perk, and it's one that I will never give up. 

All Good Things Must Come To An End...Even Summer Programs

My children cheered the day that school let out for the summer. Even my toddler, Caleb, was thrilled that he would get to have his "sissy" home along with his brother Matt. 

Me?

I had a few moments of confusion during which I thought that I would be able to actually get "more" work done than usual. After all, I could enlist the older kids for help with things around the house, as well as with taking Caleb to the bathroom and getting him his lunch, right? 

Unfortunately, things don't always turn out like you had planned. 

Instead of having more time to get my work done, I ended up playing referee for my kids while they argued over such things as

• Whose turn it was to pick out a TV show
• Whether or not Caleb had to take his pants off before he went poop
• Whether the fly in the living room was a house fly or a horse fly

You get the picture. 

Once July came, I was thrilled to have the older two out of the house for a few hours every day granted with some time alone with Caleb for a few hours every day. Matt would head off to summer cohesion every morning, and then around noon most days, I would take Cassidy to her summer program at a local park. 

If you can believe it, on those rare days when Caleb would actually take a nap, I would have complete silence in the house for two hours. 

TWO HOURS! 

Alas...now that it's August, today is the last day of both of my older kids' summer programs. The past month has gone by so fast, and after today, they will be here all the time, once again. 

Of course, this sucks puts me in an interesting position. Somehow, I have to figure out how to work while my children are here, eager for my attention. 

And then...I remember that it won't be long before they're in school again. For Caleb, this will be his first year. He'll be attending pre-school. He's really excited, as you can imagine. It's a big year for him. He's watched his brother and sister go off to school for a few years now. He hears his brother JJ talk about how wonderful kindergarten was, and how excited he is to be going into first grade. 

My baby is growing up.

The house is going to be awful quiet during the day while they're in school. Of course, I'll have plenty of time to work during that time, and I should be able to raise my income quite a bit. Even so...it's going to be difficult to get used to the quiet, and I'll have to get used to NOT getting turned into a statue every five minutes or so, by my three-year-old's magical powers. 

Hmmm...

This is all happening in less than a month. 

I do have some work to do today, but I think first, I'll sit on the floor and pretend to fly with Caleb's pixie dust. After all, it won't be long and we won't have much pixie dust around here anymore. 

Welcome!

I'd like to welcome you to my blog, Working Moms Balancing Act!

I think that many of us dream of being able to work from home, and thankfully, the Internet makes that a real possibility. In this blog, I will share with you any tips and tricks that I've learned about balancing my work with my family life, as well as invite you along on the many adventures I'll be taking over the next few weeks...months...even years!

Maybe you don't work from home, but you are a mom who works outside of the home to help support her family. This blog is for you too!

I hope you'll join me as I share about my family life, and how we (somehow!) make it all work.