I’m constantly thinking to myself, “Where did the day go?” It can be extremely challenging as a stay at home mom to balance all of the household duties, entertain my son throughout the “chores”, and make sure I’m educating him at the same time. And honestly, sometimes I’m not very good at the balancing part. I know that by me staying at home with our son means that I need to keep up with our home, because there’s no justification for a maid. I also know that as a SAHM it’s my job to provide not just love and affection to Lincoln, but also educational components throughout the day, because there’s no justification in having a tutor come in and teach Lincoln either. So how does one balance parenting, teaching, and cleaning??? How do other SAHM’s balance everything?

In the beginning of Lincoln’s life I was really good at balancing everything… the day was all about Lincoln and the house was always in complete havoc. Okay… not completely, but borderline out of control. But that was the best balance EVER, because everything was SUPPOSED to be ALL about Lincoln. As Lincoln got older and started playing contently on his own it was easy to start focusing my attention on the dishes, mopping, dusting, toilets, and laundry. But that definitely wasn’t balance, because all of my attention was on cleaning our house and not on teaching Lincoln! So I was faced with the balancing act of ensuring I was taking the time to teach Lincoln new things, but also keeping up the home so my husband saw the value in me being a SAHM. Not that me being home with Lincoln wasn’t very important to Wesley, but he still had expectations of our home life. And Lincoln being a late crawler didn’t help matters at all. It was easy to think my attention to the house had somehow affected my son’s gross motor development; however, I’ve since learned the two have nothing to do with one another.

I do my absolute best to make the most of every day with Lincoln and juggle keeping a neat home. We do things like, explore in the kitchen in the cabinets stacking plastic bowls while I do the dishes, clean the counters, etc. We cruise around the dining room table while I work on Austin Moms Blog. We rummage through the bathroom cabinets finding new things daily while I clean the tub, toilet, and shower… sexy, I know. We work on getting faster with crawling while Lincoln chases the vacuum cleaner from room to room. We learn about colors while folding laundry… actually it’s more like unfolding when Lincoln is around. And we learn about utensils while I’m putting away the dishes in the dishwasher, because Lincoln’s favorite thing to unload is the utensils!

Don’t get me wrong, the entire day isn’t filled with cleaning. We take timeouts and read books, sing songs, stack blocks, count numbers, talk about colors, etc. And just about every afternoon we take the time to sit outside on the front lawn and wait for Dada to come home while we touch grass, eat twigs, blow bubbles, and talk about all the noises we hear like cars, planes, birds, dogs barking, and wind blowing. Every bath is filled with singing from me and Wesley belting out Old McDonald, ABC’s, B-I-N-G-O and Head, Shoulders, Knees, and Toes. I do my best to make our days as educational as possible and manage my self-proclaimed COO duties of the Mack Home. Every day is a struggle to balance the lessons and laundry, but for now, I’m just excited to be a stay at home mom to a smart, content, cheerful, infectious little 14 month old that is just as happy exploring his surroundings and getting into everything as he is if I’m babbling colors and numbers.

The question remains, how do other SAHM’s and all moms alike juggle their lessons and laundry?

Lincoln is obsessed with my underwear! Here he is helping me with laundry…

Juggle Juggle Juggle Those Lessons and Laundry!

 

 

5 COMMENTS

  1. In all honesty, I’d love to see your cleaning schedule for yourself 🙂
    I just added number 2 to the mix, so balance is getting tougher.
    I do what you do often, trying to involve my daughter in chores. I ask her to find specific clothes when we are folding clothes (the purple pants!) and she puts away forks and spoons now. But I still feel like it is messier than cleaner!

    • I think the key is to not focus on everything in one day. I used to literally follow a schedule. I would look at the note section of my I Phone and see what I had planned for each day. Of course there were days that got skipped, because lets face it… the house doesn’t need to be cleaned weekly. We just moved so I haven’t gotten back on my schedule, but here’s what it looks like when I do.

      Monday:
      Laundry
      Change bedroom sheets (every other week)
      Iron
      Vacuum/Swiffer all rooms

      Tuesday:
      Kitchen
      Laundry Room (make sure it’s organized)
      Bathrooms

      Wednesday:
      Living room/dining room
      Guest Bedroom(s), including Lincoln’s
      Swiffer

      Thursday:
      Master Bedroom/Closet
      Laundry
      Iron (if needed)

      Friday:
      Swiffer/Mop (if needed)

      As my husband could tell you, I got a little lazy with the ironing. I found that keeping a cleaning schedule held me accountable and broke up the household duties. I usually had the heftier load of work from Mon-Wed and had it lighter Thur and Fri. The cleaning was not just picking up… that happens daily, but it was dusting, conditioning the leather, polishing the granite, wiping the stainless steel etc. Honestly, it doesn’t take very long to do everything and still have time for fun with your kiddo.

      Good luck and I hope this helps 🙂

  2. Your an amazing mom, wife & friend Allison!! I too struggle with the same things but it is soo worth it! There is nothing more important than these years and I couldn’t imagine it any other way!

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