Things are heating up over at Northside Makers. We have people signing up as members and there are lots of ideas of what we want to achieve with the Collective (club). Our first Coffee and Craft was a lot of fun, but I am looking forward to meeting up with crafty mums in our Craft Mothers group. We just have to find a venue that serves good coffee, has a play space and doesn't mind us sticking around for an hour or two.
How do you find time to fit in craft and kids? A lot of us are Work At Home Mums (WAHM) who supplement our crafty income with a part time job. Fitting in the work around the real work of running after a baby or toddler is trying at most times.
Fitting in sewing when my daughter couldn't roll or crawl was relatively easy. She would sit there in the bouncer and watch me as I crafted away, or sit outside my sewing room door and play with her toys. As she has gotten older, it has become more difficult and ever since she pulled the hot iron onto her foot last year, I have been even more paranoid about when and where I do my craft. 6 months of visits to the Royal Children's Burns unit has made me over protective of her.
So at the moment, my craft is squeezed into the times when I am not with her. At night when she is asleep or at her grandparents. I am looking forward to the time when she can craft with me.
3 years ago
4 comments:
I hear yah...when finn was little i gained a false sense of how much I could get done each day, and built my biz around that, suddenly....since he hit 1, that all changed dramatically, and like you i have to steal moments of time when he's asleep or at nan's.
it's hard....
It's a hard gig crafting with pre-schoolers in the house! Even when my DH is home I find it difficult to craft since my 3 year old daughter just wants to be doing what I'm doing. Sewing tends to just happen in the evening once both the kids are in bed (and I'm not even trying to run a business - I'm just crafting for me). I can't wait for them to be old enough to do some themselves or at least keep themselves entertained while I potter about!
"How do you find time to fit in craft and kids"?
I wish I had a better answer other than - I don't! I haven't been crafting nearly as much as I'd like since the birth of my second, really. I used to do more when I had only one, but it's been much harder with two and now three children, particularly since unlike my first, the other two haven't slept well.
I do get some things done after they're in bed, when I have enough energy. Otherwise, I try and get out to Brown Owls once every few weeks or so, or get a bit of knitting done in the car while waiting for school pick-up. These last couple of weeks though, I'm harbouring a bit of mummy-guilt, since it was while I was sewing that my #2 jumped off an armchair and smashed her front teeth :(
I'm beginning to accept that now is just not my time.
It was only a couple weeks ago that my almost-one-year-old switched from two naps a day to one. I read on a WAHM's blog a month or so back - I honestly can't remember whose - that the only way to work around children is to do the housework while they're awake so you can do your craft/business work while they're napping. At first it seemed like an impossible idea, but after a bit of experimentation it's working for me. The hardest bit is when it's nappy washing day - very difficult having Little Jack holding my legs while I'm carrying nappies between laundry trough and toilet. But it's the price I have to pay for toddler-free sewing time.
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