Buying Back A little Time

Lately my husband and I have become a little tired and wary of trying our hardest to keep all the plates spinning, all of the time.

You know the ones…

……Sorting out the children, the morning routine, getting them to their clubs, parties and play dates, getting ourselves to work, doing the housework, trying to update the house where it needs it, grocery shopping, sorting our finances, organising childcare, trying to maintain our own social lives as well as trying to sustain a happy marital relationship.

Plate after plate, they were beginning to fall.

Ok, so nothing really serious or disastrous has happened. No-one’s been forgotten and left at the school gates and we’ve managed to get ourselves to work mainly on time etc, but it was just starting to become too much to handle.

There was too much spinning around in my head that I knew had to be done. I was beginning to start thinking badly of myself for not managing my time correctly.

The thing is, we’ve sort of come to a new decision.

And as I’ve said in other posts over the last year, we’ve kind of got a bit of a new outlook on life.

After all, life is for living, and making the most of every precious day.

Time is valuable, especially when that time is supposed to be spent with your family and the people in your love whom you love.

Which is why we’ve finally (after much deliberating!) succumbed.

We’ve hired cleaners!

I know, I know. It’s a luxury ‘first-world problem’ kind of thing. It’s not exactly a necessity.

And we’re very fortunate to be able to finally have come to this.

The thing is, yes it is expensive, but gaining back some free time at weekends is even more important to us.

Plus I think I’ll regain some sanity too! It will be good for me, for my mind, so I don’t have to beat myself up each Sunday evening as I sit trying to relax in a house which looks likes a bomb’s gone off and with cobwebs hanging from the ceiling.

I’m hoping it will un-clutter my mind a little too!

You see, with both Mikey and I working full time, five days a week, trying to fulfil our regular, everyday parenting duties such as school runs, nursery pick ups, etc, it was slowly dawning on us that the things we really enjoy doing in life were drastically starting to slip.

The most wanted thing of all, was the time we spend with our girls.

Plus, as adults, we both have other activities we enjoy doing also, our hobbies and pastimes and that all-important ‘me time’!

It was becoming non-existent.

Mikey likes to play golf, which as any golfing wife out there knows, easily wipes out a whole Saturday or Sunday (sometimes the both if they make it a golfing weekend!), and you all know I enjoy to spend time putting pen to paper, or fingers to keypad and jotting down about my life.

So which was it to be?

Should Mikey stop his playing golf? Should he stop seeing his friends?

No.

Should I stop my hobby and leave blogging which is the only hobby in my entire life I have actually stuck at and been ok at?

No.

But equally, we don’t want the kids to lose out on invaluable time with their parents either.

The weeks up until now have been about juggling, the washing up with jigsaws, the hoovering with pretend play, or the dusting with dressing up.

Messy play filled me with dread mainly for the mess that it causes knowing something else around the house would have to give in the short time we have available clear it up afterwards! I know. Silly right?

So by finally hiring cleaners, in a way I suppose we’re actually cheating a little and buying back some time.

Not all of it, but enough to be able to spend those treasured minutes with those people precious to us.

So I absolutely cannot wait until tomorrow when we have our initial big blitz, (though I’m keeping my fingers crossed that I’m well enough to be up and out of the house!) where they’re starting off by coming in for a full ten hours!

And the girls have just had messy play time with Mummy and Daddy. Full on glitter and paint and sequins. The works! And I actually don’t care in the slightest if the glitter is accidentally spilt on the floor or if a tiny paint splurge spatters off the paint mat, as I no longer feel as though the whole weight of tidying and cleaning up is on my shoulders any more!

I feel a bit more free!