Just another day at the office

If you're new here, you may want to subscribe in a reader. Thanks for visiting!

I don’t have a desk in my house, but I’m starting to think it’s time to get one.  I just can’t figure out where to put it.

The other day, when I hired a babysitter to hang out with Belly and Miss D. while I had a conference call, I set up shop on my bed.  The term “laptop” was never so apt.  I placed my computer on my lap, propped pillows up behind my head, and rested my iPhone on my chest so that the weak speaker signal would carry my voice to the two women to whom I was talking.  I hung up and dreamed of a desk.

I’m sure I could find a suitable piece of furniture without too much effort or cost.  The problem is where to put it.  Do I clear out a corner of the playroom and establish my “office” there so I can work and keep an eye on the girls as they play?

Do I clear some bookcases out of the library/closet and shove a desk into that tiny, dark space so I can work in a spot where no one will find me?

Or do I scrap the idea of a desk altogether and accept the fact that the work-at-home-mother needs to be more mobile than an actual office space might allow?

Were I tied to a desk, I could not have run down the hall the other day with the phone pressed to my ear and quickly slammed my bedroom door.  Miss D. was in hot pursuit, and she was adamant that I — and the person to whom I was speaking — should hear the full power of her whine.  As you might expect, she did not like my closed-door tactic.  She laid down in the hallway, screaming and kicking with such force I feared we would have to replace another door.

I did my best to carry on my conversation, wondering how I would ever be able to maintain any professional credibility under these circumstances.

In the end, the issue is not about where to put a home office or a desk, it is about how to entertain my kids during the pockets of time in which I must work while they are home and awake.  I am floundering a bit as I develop strategies for doing this.  So far, the following have helped me evade some temper tantrums:

• Goldfish crackers: Lots and lots of goldfish crackers.  I’m waiting for the girls to poop orange.
• The boob tube: I’m not proud of this, but I when I absolutely need silence, I turn to Elmo (for Belly) and Princess Aurora (for Miss D.).
• Super-annoying kids music: Miss D. will usually hang out and play happily in her room for 30 minutes or more on her own if I turn on a CD.  Raffi makes me want to pierce my eardrums.  Miss D. thinks he’s dreamy.
• Buckets full of tiny items: Belly likes to empty buckets, fill them back up, and then do it again.  We have a bucket of tea party items that often keeps her entertained for up to 15 minutes at a time.  That might not sound long to any of you who don’t live with toddlers, but it is an eternity for a 15-month-old.

These are all the tools in my tiny bag of tricks for working with kids underfoot.  I asked for input from some of you, and this is some of what I received:

Steel Magnolia teaches English at a small liberal arts college. She has a 4-year-old girl and a 2-year-old boy who often want her attention while she is grading papers at home.  Like any English teacher I have ever met, she seems to sneak grading into any uninterrupted time, including while sitting in the car as her husband drives around on errands.

Bless her heart, Steel Magnolia also admitted she turns to the DVD player in emergencies, which sure does make me feel better about doing that myself.  She also attempts to complete small projects while her kids color or write at their desk in her office.   (So there’s one more vote for putting a desk in the playroom.)

I’m a Mom!…? runs a blog and (with the help of two friends) a community Web site catering to moms out of her house while entertaining three little girls, a four-year-old and 19-month-old twins.  She mentioned that a lot of what she does can be done at night and not during regular “business hours,” which has helped her balance the demands of work with the demands of her kids.  This is my ideal, as well, though it doesn’t always work out to be possible.

Nicki at Domestic Cents always inspires me to do something frugal and fun, and she came through with some great ideas about working from home.  Nicki manages her blog and used to run a bread baking business from home, all while caring for her 3 1/2-year-old daughter and her sister’s two kids.  Here are some tips she sent me that help her multi-task work and childcare:

• Give them my undivided attention for a set time then get them doing something on their own while I do something on my own.
• Yes, homemade playdough. They LOVE it.
• If I absolutely must – a movie. Yes, I use them. So sue me.
• Quiet time. If naps are way too short or non-existent then I enforce quiet time (books, puzzles, quiet whisper play)
• Be in the same room doing different things. They can play at a play tray on the kitchen floor while I’m baking. Sometimes I give them dry rice with bowls, funnels and measuring cups.
  
• I have an indoor play tent that I despise. I only pull it out once every 6 weeks or so. It’s a “kids are screaming and I need some space to think” kind of a thing. They love it because they forget about it.

Thanks to all three of you ladies for sharing your ideas and experiences with me!

Join me tomorrow when I continue work-from-home week with a special message from Stephen Colbert.

Tagged as: mom blog, mommy blogger, work from home, yankee in the south