Last week, I decided to track my day to give you an idea of what life is like when you work at home full time while trying to balance home and family. I think some people have the idea that WAHMs sit around and eat bon-bons all day, and for most of us, that couldn’t be further from the truth.br /br /I almost scrapped the whole idea when I overslept on Thursday morning, the day that I had planned to track, but I figured since I oversleep more often than I care to admit these days (thanks in part to a 10 month old that’s still waking up 1-2 times a night), it would only be fair to continue as planned and give you an honest look at my day.br /br /A couple of sidenotes before I tell you about my day: 1) I am working as much as I am right now because I have to, not because I want to. While I do enjoy my work and would probably always continue to work at least emsome/em, working full-time is not our ideal. However, sometimes you do what you have to do, and I won’t complain when God has blessed me with work that I can do while still being home with my girls. 2) Sean now works three 12-14 hour days to conserve gas and to be home to help with the girls when I have to work, so days like this are not an everyday occurrence. 3) There is a lot more free time in the day when I get up at 4:00am like I’m supposed to!br /br /emAnd now, here we go:/embr /6:00am – wake up, two hours later than planned; nurse baby while finishing the blog posts for the day, checking e-mail and setting up my transcript so I can get startedbr /6:25 – start transcribingbr /6:37 – Monkey Doodle is awake and starts crying; it’s too early, so I tuck her back in and tell her it’s still night-night timebr /6:38 – back to workbr /7:03 – Sweet Doodle’s awake again and wants to nurse; research latex allergies and reactions because of an irritated rash on Pumpkin Doodle’s leg when we removed a band-aid last nightbr /7:13 – back to workbr /7:56 – Sweet Doodle’s been standing at my chair for 10 minutes talking to me and would like to nurse again (yeah, I’m a softy on the whole schedule thing. I think it’s mommy guilt because I emdo /emwork so much); read blogs on Bloglines while I nursebr /8:07 – time to get the girls up and begin our mad morning dash; bring them down, get dressed, brush hair and teeth, put a href=”http://www.gofishguys.com/music/index.html”Go Fish Guys CD/a and some other kids music onbr /8:20 – make breakfast, cantaloupe and blueberries; talk to mom/Nona on the phonebr /8:40 – I get dressed, brush my teeth and straighten up while the girls eat (took shower Wednesday night in preparation for a busy day)br /9:00 – everyone is cleaned up and settled on the couch with some books; get back to workbr /9:10 – sean calls to tell me the car needs a $600 part (plus labor!); as I’m getting off the phone, Sweet Doodle falls over; pick her up to comfort her; the big little girls start fightingbr /9:18 – back to workbr /9:20 – Monkey Doodle knocks Sweet Doodle over; get out the girls’ new journals for them to write inbr /9:24 – back to workbr /9:38 – Sweet Doodle’s stuck standing up at the shelves and needs help getting downbr /9:44 – Pumpkin Doodle’s getting frustrated with her journal in typical 3-year-old drama queen fashionbr /9:46 – back to workbr /10:00 – I’m admittedly a little frustrated at this point because no one’s cooperating, and I thought the journals were going to be a great surprise activity to hold their attentionbr /10:07 – everyone’s still generally unhappy; maybe they’re hungry, so I get crackers for Sweet Doodle, pretzels for girlsbr /10:09 – back to workbr /10:40 – nurse Sweet Doodle; respond to blog comments from a week ago because I’m behindbr /10:55 – back to workbr /11:55 – notice the girls emptying Sweet Doodle’s wardrobe of shoes and blankets; let them take a few for their picnic but then ask them not to pull out any more and thankfully they comply so I don’t have to get up emagain/embr /12:06 – Sweet Doodle grabs Monkey Doodle’s water off the picnic bench and spills it everywhere; clean it upbr /12:09 – back to workbr /12:26 – finally done first file; start lunch and have a planned meeting over instant messenger with Shaina and a href=”http://www.dealseekingmom.com/”Tara/a about a href=”http://www.transcriptiontalk.com/”Transcription Talk/a, the daily transcription blog we run togetherbr /12:47 – take the big girls up for napbr /12:54 – nurse Sweet Doodle while I eat my lunch; lay her down for a napbr /1:17 – back to workbr /1:49 – trying to ignore the banging from upstairs as Pumpkin Doodle plays in her roombr /1:53 – Pumpkin Doodle needs help going pottybr /1:54 – back to workbr /2:52 – Monkey Doodle, who should be sleeping, starts yelling, “I got poop on me”; this is a first and one I’m oh so excited about; get her cleaned up and changed and tuck her back inbr /2:55 – back to workbr /3:30 – nurse Sweet Doodle; Sean callsbr /3:39 – back to workbr /3:47 – blue screen of deathbr /3:59 – back to workbr /4:07 – blue screen of deathbr /4:21 – back to workbr /4:31 – blue screen of deathbr /4:35 – girls awakebr /br /I’m sorry, but at this point, I gave up on taking notes about my day. My computer shut down on me three more times while I was trying to save and get a copy of my current file to someone so that all of my work wouldn’t be wasted. The plan had been to finish work by 5:00 pm and cook dinner, straighten the house, etc. I did get a href=”http://thepioneerwoman.com/cooking/2008/06/tomato-basil-pizza-two-ways-an-experiment/”this delicious and easy tomato-basil pizza/a from a href=”http://thepioneerwoman.com/cooking/”The Pioneer Woman Cooks!/a made, but I spent the rest of my time trying to see if FedEx could expedite the laptop that was already on its way from Shanghai (they could not…still waiting on it), trying to finish my file without my computer spontaneously combusting on my lap and trying to catch up from the time I lost.br /br /So there you have it. Doesn’t that make you want to become a work-at-home mom?br /br /br /a href=”http://www.mylivesignature.com/” target=”_blank”img style=”BORDER-RIGHT: medium none; BORDER-TOP: medium none; BACKGROUND: none transparent scroll repeat 0% 0%; BORDER-LEFT: medium none; BORDER-BOTTOM: medium none” src=”http://signatures.mylivesignature.com/54486/128/0E4A8EA9D2A4A002FC32D3D163051882.png” //abr /br /––––-–––––-––––––––-–––––––-––––-––––––-–-––––––-–––-–-–––br /span style=”font-size:85%;”Join us this month for a href=”http://mythreedoodles.blogspot.com/search/label/Christmas%20in%20July”Christmas in July/a. We’ll be talking crafts, preschool activities, baked goods and handmade gifts all month long!/span