How do you do it???

[Hennyhandler]

How do ya'll take care of ALL your animals and still go to work or school, take care of the house, after school activities, errands, other obligations, what have you all in one day?? I understand that some people may not have a whole lot of animals but I have heard of and seen people on here who have horses, chickens, goats, dogs and plenty more. I just don't get it. I LOVE my animals and want to have even more but sometimes with everything else going on I feel like I don't have any time to spend time with them.

I suppose some of ya'll may only go to school or are housewives which I guess provides a little more time since your at the house more. OR you have a farm. Ohh how awesome.

Okay, getting back on track. SO what do ya'll do to get what needs to be done during the day?

 

[sonjab314]

Kids.....source of cheap manual labor lol

 

[nurseronda]

Quote:
I really don't think anyone does it all. Coming from someone who's been there, tried it, and failed miserably, you have to decide to do things in their seasons, not make everything "open season" all at the same time. I refused to do a garden and chickens while I was working full time. When my husband agreed to let me work part time and stay home he realized this is where I belong. I hardly work at all now, and financially it's tough. We have to budget our money very carefully. My son just can't participate in everything he wants to do. We carefully decide what is important to buy and not buy. We use what we have instead of running out and buying new. Now we have lots of garden and chickens and since I am happy, my husband is happy.

Some suggestions: You prioritize your time carefully, assign reguar chores to your children, divide the remainder of the work with your spouse, elicit others who can drive your kids to activities, pay someone to come in and clean your house once in a while, make large meals so there are left overs to eat for lunches or a second supper later (or freeze the left overs for later use), get rid of the TV or minimize your time with it. You have to lower your standards some times but don't allow house work and stuff to build up too much or it will be almost impossible to catch up. Try to find ways of cutting back so you can work less and have more time for other activities. Minimize clutter: less to clean and organize, more space to use. Hire a dependable, hard-working teen to come and help with housework, yard work, or other chores.

Hope this was helpful.

 

[RThomas]

I take care of the two dogs, fish, and chickens. My wife takes care of the horses and her two cats. I take my son to school in the mornings and my wife picks him up in the afternoons. I do the house cleaning and all outside work. My wife does the groceries, laundry, and pays bills. And we both work fulltime Monday thru Friday. We have everything worked out fairly evenly. We didn't plan it that way - that's just the way it worked out.

 

[Hennyhandler]

Well, me personally I don't have any kids or a spouse. Just wondering how that works for ya'll. I do have to give it to you, nurseronda, less clutter does make things easier.

 

[Karrie13]

Hmm... Well I have chickens (two coops and one brooder going now), dogs, cats, horse, soon to have quail and ducks. I work full time and have two children that are in many activities. During the summer I have a huge garden and have my fruit garden. I process a lot of our food (veggies, jams, jellies, fruit butters, and chicken) I also am a crafter (scrapbooking, card making, sew, and will sometimes work with yarn). My husband is an over the road truck driver so he isn't home but weekends to help.

We live in Minnesota and have an outdoor wood boiler so that is my responsibility too right now. I also deal with all the Drs appointments and everything else.

I just make time to spend with each and every group of animals and kids. I get up early to do animal chores and the kids each have certain chores they do each day. I do go behind them in the evening to make sure things get done though. We even take turns cooking dinner throughout the week (kids are almost 12 and 13). I don't watch much TV, never enough time but that is ok. I don't think I miss much. I enjoy sitting out in the coop or pen and wacthing my girls. As soon as they see me coming out of the window in their coop they start talking to me and come out to see what goodies I have brought them.

My crafting is mainly done in the winter time which leaves summer to work in the garden's. Through the years I have developed a system that works well for me so that everything gets done. I like schedules even though I don't follow them exactly, they are fluid!

I like and need to have multiple things going on at the same time and I do! Both at home and work.

 

[3goodeggs]

to the OP: That's just an urban legend, dear.

no one does it all...well.
take care of the live things first and everything else gets done when it gets done.

 

[justbugged]

I will admit that I am a stay at home wife. I am partially disable, and have not been able to find paid work that I can do since 2004. So I get to spend a lot of time lurking around BYC. I have found that it really doesn't take a lot of time to feed the cats, dogs, finches, and chickens, and fish around here. For me the biggest thing is to not forget anyone. (They are all very good about letting me know what they need.

) I have most of my gardens set up with auto timers for the watering part. So I can seem to manage to keep everything and everyone alive for the most part. It also seems to help that I don't need the house to look like a showroom, or a magazine picture all the time. I figure my house is cleaner than some, and dirty enough to still be healthy.

 

[Tartannik]

It certainly isn't easy, i have quite a few animals and 4 kids and I do most of it including the housework and cooking meals (everything is home made) and baking.
But, at the minute i don't work, I normally work 6 weeks on 6 weeks off and when i am working it is hard, the house always suffers but i prefer to have my animals and kids looked after than have a really clean house that is just gonna get dirty and untidy again!!

I suppose we do what we want too, my friends probably think i am mad but they love buying my eggs!!

 

[Hennyhandler]

I have to say to 3goodeggs you are correct. It is just wishful thinking. Karrie13 you are doing pretty good from my standpoint. I need that kind of system.

I figure it is what it is, you know. Just wondered if everyone else was in the same boat. Good times one way or another. I wouldn't have it any other way and I am sure most of ya'll would agree.