Tackle it Tuesday - Catching Up

If you're trying to juggle both career and homemaking, you are not alone. In fact, the Proverbs 31 Woman did it - and she did it well.

These days, I am working a part-time job at the library, working part-time from home as a freelance writer, and - yes - working full-time as a homemaker. To tell you the truth, I'm struggling a little to balance it all out, or to at least balance it so it works smoothly.

This week I've made a vow to quit procrastinating in the area of writing. In the past couple of years, I found that my life was getting busier and busier, so I put off the easily put-off: my freelance career. The result was not more time but was, instead, a frustrated wife and mother who felt that her own desired career was put on hold in order to make everyone else happy and comfortable. You know what a bad thing that was. It made for a crabby wife and mom - one who was letting the seed of resentment creep in. No more, however, as I have been making an hour's writing time a day a priority. Mind you, an hour is not much, but the hours do add up and they come together in a decent finished product. I have had two unfinished novels on hold, both of which I have begun to dig into a bit deeper with a committment to finish them and get them out the door and into the hands of a publisher.

Yesterday, I made a batch of soap and got it "incubating." Tomorrow I will cut it into bars and let it cure for a month. I didn't have any essential oils but I did have a bottle of fragrance/flavor oil in orange cream. I used that in this batch of castille soap and it turned the soap a beautiful yellow with a luscious smell. When one must improvise, she often finds that what she was doing turns out wonderfully.

My garden is, I believe, the victim of cutworm. They have destroyed one tomato plant and one bell pepper plant. Tonight after work I will be collaring my plants with stiff cardboard.

Another project I am working on, and have almost completed, is a book bag to place for sale on Etsy. It's coming out beautifully, in pink and gray. I work on it while I watch a little tv with the family. I really don't watch, but listen while I knit. I guess I sit in the family room in order to spend a bit of time with my husband and children.

Time is time and it is manageable. You just have to make a list of priorities and work on down that list as you can. Don't ever say that you "don't have time" because you really have all of the time there is. The real issue is: How will you manage your time? Hopefully you can answer, "I will manage my time in a way that honors God and my family."