Hi. I'm Laura Vanderkamp. I'm a mother of five, an author, journalist, and speaker.
And I'm Sarah hart Unger, a mother of three, practicing physician, writer, and course creator. We are two working parents who love our careers and our families.
Welcome to best of both worlds. Here we talk about how real women manage work, family, and time for fun, from figuring out childcare to mapping out long.
Term career goals.
We want you to get the most out of life.
Welcome to best of both worlds. This is Laura.
This is an episode that is airing in sort of mid to late February, right after Valentine's Day. I hope everyone had a great celebration, if that's something you do. But we're going to be talking in this episode about quality time. So obviously relationships are important for all of us, and some of that is simply built about spending time
to gather. So we are recording this prior to Valentine's Day, so we thought we'd have a quick discussion of it, Like, Sarah, do you guys do anything for Valentine's Day?
We don't tend to do anything super traditional like Romance was, so it's not a night that Josh and I go out to dinner or schedule a one on one date or anything like that. I think more he really prefers to avoid crowds, and if that's a night that everybody else is going to be hitting the nice restaurants, that's probably a night we're not going to want to do. So when we were young and childless, we used to make French toast and drink a lot of champagne and
eat free. That was like our tradition. But nowadays we don't even do that. We do do a family treasure hunt, which I have introduced on this podcast before, but I'm going to mention it again just because I've gotten so many lovely emails of people who have adopted this tradition in their families, and so I figure, if this touches some more listeners, then why not share it one more time.
And that is the fact that my dad, when we were growing up, developed this like little game where he would just do little treasure hunt clues that would lead to a Valentine's surprise, which was not really a surprise. It was always a heart shape box of seas candies. Those are good things and they were very much geared to the age of us, so like they started out as really simple clues, and then by the time we were in high school, the clues were like in French,
and you know, it became more difficult. So we'd run around the house and get our little prize. And so as soon as my kids were old enough to kind of look at pictures and figure out the clues, we started it here and we've been doing it every year and they love it. We don't. We're not like a big tradition or like celebration type of family, but this one has really stood the test of time and I can't wait. So when this airs, hopefully we will have
had a great Valentine's Treasure hunt. And if you end up adopting this in the future, let me know, because those stories have made me so happy. I'm sure they make my dad happy as well.
Yeah.
Well, I could see you adopt this for any sort of holiday, right, I mean, you could do an arbor day scavenger leads to a plant, leads to a plant. I don't know, Yeah, labor Day. I don't know what you do with that, something with their job anyway.
Yeah, that's so cute. I love that idea. That's really fun.
It just made me think that the C's candy box I had when I was growing up, we kept my krans in a Whitman's Sampler box. I'm sure like my parents must have gotten a Whitman's Sampler at some point, and then you know it was a box, and so where do you put your crans? Well, you put your crans in like, you know, an available box with a lid that you have, which means that I never knew that that wasn't for krans. And then like later in life, I would see these in store and be like, what.
Those are the krans here in the chocolate aisle.
So my husband and I actually met on February fifteenth, so we kind of have a Valentine's Day oriented time for celebrating our relationship this year. We are we actually got okay, So we met on February fifteenth, two thousand and three, and then got engaged on February fifteenth, two thousand and four. So this is actually the twin fieth
anniversary thereof this year. However, when we're saying this ahead of time, I guess we're not doing anything with the two of us that I am aware of because we are going to be on something of an epic family trip, which I will talk about later, but yeah, it was, you know, so I think that is just probably not going to happen this year, although we are looking to do something to celebrate our actual wedding anniversary, which you know, we got married in September of two thousand and four,
So we'll celebrate our twentieth anniversary in some way, shape or form, maybe incorporate whatever we would have done on the fourteenth fifteen.
Yeah, I didn't realize you were having your twentieth this year.
That's exciting. I know we're getting old some.
Milestone and it fits very well with our theme.
Exactly, which is quality time. So Sarah, why don't you talk a little bit about why we were thinking about doing this episode.
Yeah, well, we talk a lot about goals on this podcast. Maybe I love it a lot, and so it comes up and we talk about things that make us happy, and relationships are always a common theme, and how do you strengthen a relationship? I mean, Laura has pointed out a lot of times it's just sort of like the time you spend together, which can be serendipitous, Like maybe you're just like at work, so you're spending a lot of time with your colleague and that deepens your friendship.
Or it can be really really purposeful and intentional where you carve out time to spend with a certain person
and then that strengthens the relationship as well. And so we thought that kind of an honor of this belated Valentine's Day themed episode that we would talk a little bit about quality time as it relates to different relationships, beginning with the romantic type and fun fact, it is one of the five love languages that are famous, the other ones being acts of service, words of affirmation, gifts, and touch, and Laura and I both agree that we don't want to pick.
Yeah, I know this is like, I don't know that one is my particular language. I think they all sound great, Like, I mean, you could do my dishes and me how wonderful I am, while giving me a BackRub and you know, and giving me gifts.
I'd be good with all of that. Really, that sounds great.
So, yeah, in this episode, we're gonna be talking about how to spend quality time with your partner, your kids, and yourself, because that is a relationship that is important and I think is worth developing. In fact, you might even sort of think about this how you are nurturing your relationship with yourself, because of all the people you spend time with, you clearly spend the most time with yourself.
So it is worth having that be a positive and loving relationship, which we certainly hope that all our listeners are experiencing. But if you are not, there are some great ways to kind of nudge that along. So to start with the partner though, in honor of Valentine's Day, for people who are partnered with someone, we have both noticed that as your kids get older, there's a slight change and sort of the time available And it's maybe not what people think about, right, So you're seeing this.
Yes, so I'm someone and you've heard me talk about it that that feels like there is more free time in the big kid years, or maybe a little bit more mental space, and I find it a bit easier. However, the one exception to that is finding one on one time with my husband that is more difficult, mostly just because the kids are up later. Now Laura's kids didn't necessarily have early bedtimes ever, but I mean now it's not uncommon for my kids to want to stay up
later than I do. That is because I'm a bit of an extreme early bird. But still that means that, like, you know, those quiet conversations that used to happen after kid bedtime or even like in the baby baby years, when you maybe would give your baby their baby food dinner, put them to bed, and then have like an adult dinner, those are so far removed from our current reality. Like we're not doing that, and so we have to be much more purposeful if we want to be alone together.
And I don't mean that in like that way necessarily, although that's important too, but even just to like have a nice conversation can be a challenge.
Yeah, no, I say, my kids never went to bed or this wasn't something like we could reliably spend time together after the kids went to bed. I mean just because and it's not that I don't want my kids to have an early bedtime.
I've tried. They just like sit there.
I mean even last night Henry was just like in his room, playing on the floor in the dark.
Like, Henry, you gotta.
Get in your bed and go to sleep, and eventually he did, but he's not. It's not you know, a situation you could just like completely relax and like there will be no calling for you. I mean, he's still up and something could happen. So yeah, it's it's just that's never been a great option for us. But fortunately there are other times and I think you really just have to look at the whole of the week and be a little strategic. So, Sarah, what are some times that you guys have done?
Yeah, so I would say we're still a work in progress in many ways. In this we are pretty successful with scheduling weekend dates. We have a number of babysitters. It's actually not our core nanny that we use for these types of things. She really prefers not to work weekends, and so we respect that and have continued to employ the same couple of babysitters that my kids are really comfortable with. We are starting to almost age out of
the need for that. We're like right on the cusp as Annabel is turning twelve, but right now we still are not giving her that responsibility, especially if it's a longer night, and so we do hire someone and I try to do one to two each month. It's very much dictated by our call schedules, and I also try to strike a balance between kind of the one on one stuff that's just us and then the kind of
like fun with other people. And honestly, I think my husband would prefer that most of our interactions be more just us, and I enjoy some of the social time, so it's like being really respectful of the other's person. I think we do a good job kind of negotiating that. So that's like, you know, number one, just scheduling it, and it doesn't have to be a weekend. By the way, I think weeknights are such an awesome opportunity for so many couples because you can have your caregiver just kind
of like stay late. That doesn't always work for us as well well, for a number of reasons, some of it being that I often have two kids in different locations in the evening doing different activities, so there's just not enough drivers to go around, even if our nanny
is doing all of the kid duty. And then also my husband's schedule is fairly unpredictable at night, and it would just be sad for me to be so looking forward to something like I could schedule sling for myself when we get into self love, but with him on a Wednesday is like a little dicey. And so I have good friends who love to plan on yoga classes together.
So that's like they do a couples walk. They just walk to the yoga studio, they take yoga together, and then they like talk and walk on the way back. So they're like double dutying with exercise and couple time. And then don't underestimate the totally parractical trips like a trip to Costco together. I think I've talked about, like we had a date to go mattress shopping and it was actually like really fun, like I remember it. It was a lot of years ago.
Yeah, we in the run up to the holidays, we actually went on a Costco date. I mean, so what we've done is we actually have care for Henry on a couple saturdays a month during the day, and so rather than like going out we I mean, we've just not been going out for dinner that much with the
two of us. Often we'll take the bigger kids somewhere if we, you know, have the option to do that, or we have various things going on, but you know, with that that gives the option for us to come up with something a little bit more spontaneous or so just spend some time together on Saturday afternoon. But one week I was like, I knew my husband really wanted to go to Costco. It was something that we he just he gives like, whoa, we're down on the parmesan
cheese and the sam and for bagels. We need to get to Costco. So I was like, Okay, we'll go to Costco. And I don't know, it was like our biggest ticket Costco trip ever. It was something about the two of us being there, and I mean guess maybe was because we were thinking it was sort of our date for the week. We're just like, oh, yes, let's get this, let's get this, and next thing, I know, it was like we could have actually gone somewhere really nice for what we spent at Costco. But anyway, we
did have our parmers on cheese and our salmon. That got us through for at least a few weeks, I guess. But it speaks to the idea of having some sort of you know, if you have little kids, having some sort of regular childcare that is outside your working hours.
And the reason is that planning a date takes work, especially if you are needing to both find a time that both of you are free, figure out the extra caregiving time, you know, if it's finding a babysitter for that night or whatever, and then there's ways to make
it easier and all that. But all those steps mean it is somewhat less likely to happen, particularly if you've had a really busy week at work, or you know, someone's feeling resentful that they're doing a lot of the mental load, or you know, whatever it happens to be.
So having at least some regular time means that you can be slightly more spontaneous and say like, oh, well the weather's nice, we could go for a walk in the botanical garden at this time, or oh, Joe and Sally are going to be in town, we could meet up with them for a drink. But you don't have to decided all of this ahead of time, and I think reducing that makes it somewhat easier to do something in the moment.
So just going to put out a shout out for that.
And we are sort of graduating into the time where we can actually go out without a sinner, which is nice as well. You know, obviously our older children, the three older children are all old enough to babysit if need be, and so we've started occasionally leaving them with Henry and Alex and going out for an hour or ninety.
Minutes for something if we want to do that.
So you know, it does get better eventually, because then that gives you the opportunity to be a little bit more spontaneous too, because it's like, wow, we got to live in sitter, and you know, they can say if they have something they need to do or whatever, but sometimes you know, if they're just sitting around watching their iPad, Like we often will pay for date night sitting as we would pay for a babysitter, So hey, you're getting paid to watch your iPad.
That's like even even better. I love it.
And short can be great. I mean, these hour long things can still be rejuvenating, especially if you just kind of like need a break from that parenting role just getting out of the house together. But I will say long is also kind of amazing. And I know it's harder to orchestreet, but there are ways around it. If you don't have a childcare provider that's willing to do nights,
families do swaps. You could depending how old your kids are just like be like, can we do a sleepover where your kids come this weekend and our kids go to your house two weekends from now, and you both get to enjoy some either just stay home and have a couple of time or go on I really short get away like a hotel an hour away or something like that, because I will say the short trips I take with my husband are very rejuvenating to our relationships,
to ourselves. I look forward to them. I love them. We often do some like planning type stuff, but we do a lot of relaxation and connection and stuff too, and I just I love them. If it's something that you might be able to make happen and explore, I highly recommend giving it a try.
I think there's also a question of just general awareness, which is good to have. And one of the upsides of tracking my time is I can look back and see if there was some quality time spent during the week, and so I might have a story of like, oh,
my husband and I never spend any time together. We never do anything together, And sometimes that feels true because again I'm often the one orchestrating the dates, and sometimes I get a little bit like I don't feel like planning a single other thing after planning for seven people to do X, Y and Z. But then I can look back and say, well, actually, you know, in twenty twenty three, we had a bunch of really cool dates, like we went to a Billy Joel concert together, we
went on a bike ride, press going to a brewery on one Saturday, we went to a Sixers game. We actually finally got away overnight for one night for our first time in four years. So it did happen. It may not happen frequently, but it did happen. And then I can also see sort of the little times that are built into the week. So my husband and I actually do talk most mornings after he gets back from driving Jasper or the middle schoolers to the bus or
to jazz band. If he's either working at home or not going into his office until later in the day, he'll come back to have breakfast and I'm usually having breakfast around that time too, so we'll sit there and have our eggs together in the morning. For you know, it's just like ten minutes, but we are talking, and so I need to notice that that is happening, right, So it's not that we never spend time together, but
here we are eating breakfast. We probably eat lunch together once a week or so if he's working from home, so, you know, just being aware of it. And then if I am aware of it, then I'm like, Okay, well, given that we are doing this, I probably shouldn't just like disappear into my office at seven thirty five if I can, if the little boys aren't awake yet, because this is an opportunity.
Yes, that's as I would say, seize the opportunity. See, let's take a quick break before we move on to talking about some other types of connection time, and we'll be right back.
Well, we are back talking all things quality time, boosting relationships by spending intentional time together with partners, with children, and with ourselves. So moving on to the kid category. I know Sarah and I have both made it a goal at various points to do more one on one time with our kids. When you have something of a brood with a larger family, this can become challenging, but it often is among the more pleasant parts of parenting.
So, Sarah, what have you been doing in that category?
Yeah, so I have kind of added it to my weekly planning process to look at our week and what's going on and see, like, is there somewhere that it would make sense that I could take one kid to do something. Maybe it's just I'm taking a kid to a birthday party and I'm gonna take them to Target or something. A lot of times I'll just do dinner. So you know, if a kid has an activity that ends maybe at six thirty, we could do a quick dinner afterwards, one on one. And it does not have
to be fancy. It could be Panera, it could be fast food. It just has to be us together, like and I don't even have to make a big thing of it, not necessarily deep questions, but just have the opportunity there for that connection. And my kids, I mean, I think the more kids you have, my guess is the more they love being by themselves because they are often just their best selves, on their best behavior, the most interesting, and you can tell they just really really
enjoy that time. You know. The other benefit is if you have a partner and you have more than two kids. Anytime somebody takes two kids, then there's another kid left over, and so sometimes it can feel like the right split is like three and zero, like somebody takes all the kids and somebody takes none, but actually two in one can be quite pleasant depending on the different combinations, and we try to balance out who has the one because
it shouldn't always be the same partner. But yeah, I mean, just paying attention to the opportunities and keeping it simple. I do try to do like full on mommy days once a year. I haven't totally committed to that this year, but my kids really love it, so I'll probably also do that.
Yeah, I mean, I would suggest so.
One of the issues Sarah had last summer when she was doing the one on one day is because she obviously has a fairly inflexible work schedule with seeing patients, and so it always wound up happening on Tuesdays, and I think you were booked like three tuesdays in a row with your one on one time with the kids, and so then of course everything else that she had to do was all shoved to Thursday, and it was like, you know, compressed in and she was like telling me like,
oh my god, I've been on a microphone for eight hours straight now. So slightly challenging, which we get, Like, I know, many of our listeners have work schedules where that's not going to work very easily to commit to the one on one times, I would say, though, you can look into weekends, like it doesn't have to be during the day. We think like during the day on summer because the weekday, because that's something you might be
able to book out and do. But I know we split the one on one days last summer, my husband and I and he actually did the two younger boys, and those definitely happened on Saturdays, right, Like that was not going to happen on a Tuesday. I mean I could have, but it was just going to the logistics of him doing that were slightly more complicated. And Saturday Sunday are available, right, so he would take one of them,
I would have the other kids. And then that happened again another weekend, And so that can absolutely work as well. You just have to coordinate with your partner and maybe two weekend where there are fewer activities so the driving isn't so crazy for the person who's taking all the others.
But yeah, we've done.
One on one days I think every summer, just because Yeah, the kids really do look forward to it. And I remember when I first did this, and Ruth was probably like four, and she's gonna be twelve this summer. So this is eight years ago when I was first doing it, and I took her to an amusement park for the day and I was just like, this is just like it's blissful, Like we can do whatever she wants and so we don't have to fight about it. Like she wants to go ride the Merry Go Round, we go
ride the Merry Go Round. She wants to get the funnel cake, we go get the funnel cake. Because it was not something that had to be negotiated with multiple other interested stakeholders, and so it just made it so much more pleasant and low key to do it, and so I was like, this is so fun. And so yeah, we've tried to repeat that every summer, and as the kids get older, they often ask for trips for Christmas. So this year Sam is going to go on a diving trip with Michael. I'm going to take Jasper to
New York. And this just wound up happening, but Ruth and I have a trip planned as well now, so.
I'm looking forward to it.
I do enjoy these quite a lot, but it's also just being aware of it, right, So I mean, like, I'm sure you think about like going into one kid's room and just chatting with them for a while.
No, definitely. I mean I have like a bedtime routine most nice where I try to at least try to get each kid alone for at least a couple of minutes. It's not always a long period of time, because sometimes one kid takes forever to put to bed and then that doesn't leave as much time for the other kids, but definitely try to at least go in those rooms and like make the opportunity happen. And I got to say,
those one on one trips really are fun. I think the magic age is around six to seven where they become really not a lot of work and really enjoyable.
So think about that as well. And if you have two kids, like one fun thing might be to do like a maybe Friday to Saturday and your partner and you like split the kids up and you each get a different kid, and like, yes, that's different than a couple's trip, but it can be its own kind of source of really fun memories and maybe do something very much tailored to that's kids interests and be really fun.
Yeah, and certainly one of the reasons again having some childcare for Henry on the weekend, I definitely think about using that time for spending quality time with the older kids, because again having a much younger child, they wind up taking a lot of your time and effort just because they are little and need more things, and so if they're around, it becomes very challenging to spend time with the older kids. So when he's not there, I can try to take advantage of it. So for instance, Alex
and I are doing a Lego project together. We are building the game truck, so you know, we sit there and go through a bag each day, trying to make sure we have that twenty to thirty minutes to gather. Like the other day, I went for a walk with Ruth or Jasper and I now sing in choir together, so we have some of that time together. And Sam's a little bit more challenging because he's kind of introverted like.
I, but we sees what we can with talking with him.
I actually had lunch with him yesterday because he was home sick from school, but it was nice to be able to do that. And just a practical tip if you have lots of kids and they're in different schools. Sometimes there are random things like half days or in service days, teacher in service days. If you've got these on your calendar enough ahead of time, you could potentially block one of these off, or your partner could block
one of these off from work. I mean, because a you know, if you're using school as childcare, you kind of have to figure that out anyway, Like somebody is going to have to cover that day, But if your other kids are in school, then you could use that time as potential one on one time. So I, for instance, have taken some of the older kids out to lunch if they have a half day on a particular day, and that's something we could make work.
That's nice.
I like that all right. Well, our third category that we didn't want to leave out. I think Laura actually wanted to do a whole episode on this, so maybe we'll have to expand it in in the future, and that is loving Yourself.
I was gonna call it be your Own Valentine, but our recording schedule didn't quite work.
Twenty twenty five five.
But yeah, we're like, no, that doesn't work with our calendar to do this before Valentine's Days whatever, All right, be your own Valentine Day six days later.
You can be your own Valentine six days later.
Yeah, there's no time limit to self love.
Yes, we may have to recycle that one in a future year. So, Sarah, what do you do for your making yourself feel special?
I really think some of this is about leaning in and maybe it's things that you would do otherwise, but like approaching them with an attitude of well, I didn't mean to rhyme this, but like to be like really grateful if you do happen to have free time to do something for yourself, or if you've made the free time to do something for yourself. And I know we're very busy, we are all working, we have a lot
of kids. But those times that you're able to maybe get a manny petty during lunch or book a massage on a day off or something like that, like to really look forward to them, to think about them, to think about how you might best use these pockets of times to serve yourself and to rest, and then to really try to be present when you're experiencing them. So
those are very cliche type things. And I know, like there's a lot of backlash about like being punitive about self like if you're not doing the I don't know, Like there's a lot of talk about self care, and I actually love the book Real Self Care by Pooja Lashman, who definitely talks about the other side of self care. And yet these very traditional actions can be really wonderful as well if you enjoy them. I also see a
lot of my social endeavors as self care. Again, also because I do feel like I'm the more extroverted member of our family. Probably well a couple of my kids might be similar to me, but I really crave some time with others, especially other women, and so I see my group runs as self care and my book club
and things like that. And finally, I feel like the I don't know the intentionality around just being really lazy sometimes and just being like I am going I don't care what the house looks like, I'll deal with it tomorrow. I'm going to lie down and read this book while my kids are playing video games and I'm just gonna like order takeout for dinner, and like I have two
whole hours to do that. Like that is sometimes just so needed and so nice, and I think it's better to do it with like I'm giving this as a gift to myself, rather than feeling guilty that you're like not doing something else. So I've worked really hard at that, and I feel like I enjoy my lazy times more than I perhaps use two in years past.
Yeah, and noticing these and being aware of them when space is open and you can leave it open. Right this morning, Michael was driving the older kids to high school and jazz band, so they were all out of the house at about seven oh two, and you know, I've been running around getting them out the door. But then the little boys were still asleep, and so I was like, I have my freshly brewed cup of coffee here.
I am going to go sit in the formal living room, you know, and go sit down and look out the window, look at the rising sun and the wintry landscape and just sort of relaxed. And I looked out the window for a while and I read some blogs, and I just, you know, it was like, this is my me time, and it's my self care here, you know. And I'm sure I could have done something else, Like there's things
I could do. I could have started working, I could have picked up the ridiculous number of things that seem to wind up on the floor, but this was the time for me to relax and enjoy it myself. So, you know, I see noticing pockets of time like that and then choosing not to fill them even though there's always things that could fill them. And then, you know, I really think of self care as more of being interested in your own life, which is doing things that
make you happy simply because they make you happy. And you know, there may be other things that are part of that. I mean, I've you know, with singing, it's partly about helping to make worship services better with my choir and all that, but it's also just because I like it, and so I'm willing to make space for that in my life, many hours a week for it.
And then other things like my projects of like listening to Bach every day, like that's something that I enjoy, or getting design books from the library and then spending time reading those, like looking through books of interesting architecture, putting dollhouse scenes in my office. That's been a new thing in the past like six months that I've It's
been an interest for a long time. And then I finally realized how I could just buy, Like I've found a place that has enough stuff that I can find stuff I want to put and you know, figuring out where I would put it. And it's just like things that make you feel like life is fun, life is cool. So it doesn't just have to be the bubble baths. Like, obviously, if you love bubble baths, take all the bubble baths
you want. They don't need to take that long, you know, twenty minutes that can no matter what's going on in life. You could probably find twenty minutes somewhere to take a bubble bath if that's what you want to do. But I think I would challenge people to really commit yourself to a hobby you are very into, or anything along those lines that would upgrade your daily existence and make you feel like life is awesome.
And I like what you said about like having no reason to do it other than you find it fun. I mean, I was thinking about that on my run this morning. I'm like, this is so silly, and yet who cares because I find it fun and I only get to live once.
So whatever, enjoy your life, right, That's what being your own Valentine really means. Well, moving on to the question section, I will read this since I think it was meant for Sarah that I can chime in with slight additions at the end. But this person writes in that you would like to know more about your daily planning of five to ten minutes so every morning, as those who listen to our Morning Routine episode a few weeks ago, Sarah does a little bit of daily planning each morning
as part of for morning routine. So she said, what questions do you ask yourself? What does that five to ten minutes actually look like? So maybe you could say exactly what you are doing in that five to ten minutes Sarah.
Yes, and don't sell yourself short. She specifically said she wanted to hear Laura's daily planning too. So here you go, Alana, this this is for you. So I it's very early. I got my coffee and I pull out my planner and I kind of like set up my little day template that I write in my home anichi, kind of like put my basic schedule stuff in there. The way I do that is I look at my weekly schedule, which is also instead homeinnichi. So I am kind of flipping back and forth a little bit. I scan that
day's entry. So sometimes I've already kind of assigned myself something like, oh, you know, you have to turn in a Bestlaid Plans episode that day, so that's like an automatic I'm going to be doing that that day. Other times there's nothing assigned, but I might have like specific obligations scheduled based on different hours. So again, many people do this digitally minds on paper. So I look at that, and then I also look at my task list for the week, which is actually on the same layout.
It's just on the left.
I kind of list all kinds of stuff that I'm trying to get moved forward on during that week. So by looking at the day's list, I can see what's urgent, what's happening, and then I can think, eh, do I have room to add any of these like additional week
type tasks, And then I don't know. My brain kind of synthesizes that, and then in the Hobannici I draw out my little daily layout to kind of show when I'm occupied, and then on the right I make my task list, trying to keep in mind, again if I don't have a lot of time where I'm not occupied, I probably can't put a lot of things on the list, and then that probably takes about five to ten minutes. Do I always get everything done in a given day.
Absolutely not. But I like having a menu of suggestions to at least start from. And I'd say if I get through fifty to seventy percent of what I have laid out for myself, I'm pretty happy.
Yeah, there's a side.
This listener wrote that every time she listens to us, so she references us in our household as the besties that live on the street, which I love, Like, we want to be your besties who live up the streets.
So I'm embracing that.
So I plan my weeks on Thursday or Friday and list out what needs to happen professionally and personally, and then as I'm going through the week, usually the day before, I will list out what I need to do the next day.
And it doesn't always have it.
Sometimes I do this when I start my work day, but I try to do it the day before just so I get a general sense of what I need to start with, and if there's anything that's sort of hard landscape in the day, I can block that in and figure it around it. If it is a very busy day, I definitely need to do it the day before to figure out how to fit all the pieces in. If it's not so busy a day, sometimes it's a
little bit more free form. I might have one big goal for the day, like edit this chapter or you know, write all this stuff, and that kind of happens as it's going to happen. I generally do some of the little daily stuff that I have to do first, since I'm more likely to get interrupted between about eight and nine am, when kids are still getting out the door, so I tend to start with the interruptible stuff, which would be flogging posting the next day's vander Hack over there.
Sometimes I forget to do that, then I need to post today is vander Hack. You know, it's the problem of a daily newsletter. Sometimes like oh, yeah, it's another day again. I guess I should have done that. But yeah, that's generally when it happens, and I aim to only put something on the list for the day if I'm going to do it. And I know that Sarah and I have a slight different feeling about this, but I'm sort of like, I don't want to put it on there.
And then not do it and feel bad about it.
So I'd rather only put it on it if I am truly committing to do it, which means that the list has to be short like. It can't be long, like, it can't have multiple things that won't possibly fit in that time that I have available, because then I'm not going to do them, and then I feel like, well,
why did I even put that there? So generally it is only the things I plan to do short and if I finish, which happens right like, I might be done with all of this at two o'clock, then I can go pick some other stuff, right like, there's a long list of possibilities that one could busy your time with, So I can go find some other work. That's fine, but I'd rather make that decision at two o'clock rather than assign myself more than I might handle.
Or you can have self care time, self.
Care time, that's true, and just go get another cup of coffee and sit in the living room again, experience it a different time of day.
That sounds very exciting.
So let's well love of the week, so mine. I have a very mixed relationship with YouTube because one of my children has had to have YouTube privileges provoked for the time being. So I know there's plenty of wretchedly bad stuff on YouTube. However, there's also some very good stuff. I guess it's because of the nature of life, and there's good stuff and there's bad stuff.
This is humanity. And I have been listening to most of my works of Bach through YouTube.
I thought I would do it on Apple Music, but oftentimes the whole recording it's hard to get a whole recording of like multiple pieces together, and they might have split them into like here's the sinfonia and here's the corral and here's the aria in a cantato. I want to listen to the whole twenty five minute thing in a row. But there are lots of performances on YouTube.
So I've been doing most of it just listening to a performance that has been posted on YouTube, and so that's just a much more convenient way to listen to it. And so it's kind of cool because there are like any given BWV number you know of, Bach has a thousand of them. There's a performance of it somewhere on YouTube. Somebody in the world performed it, recorded it, put it up there and so I can watch it and it's great.
It's amazing. It's actually amazing. Think about how like your nineteen eighties self would have conceived of that, like.
Not have done they I could not have done this project then, I mean because there you wouldn't have been able to get the recordings of all of these.
I mean it's just like yeah, or obscure ones love it.
Well, mine is going to be following professional running a little bit more than I have before. I really enjoyed well, a few weeks prior to when this air is watching the Olympics marathon trials, which were in my home state. So that was super fun, Like I actually watched it on TV. I have like a very low number of hours in my life spent watching live sports, and I'm like, this is actually really cool. So a love for that and then a future love I think is going to
be the Olympics, Like I cannot wait. I'm going to like super lean into it and with the kids too, I think so exciting, Like I found my brand of pro sports that I enjoy.
Paris twenty twenty four all into it, all right, Well, this has been best of both worlds. We've been talking all things quality time, how you can spend one on one time with your partner, your kids, and then how to be your own Valentine. I'm going to use that phrase even though we are after Valentine's Day, how you can show yourself some love as well. So we will be back next week with more on making work and life fitting out there.
Thanks for listening. You can find me Sarah at the shoebox dot com or at the Underscore Shoebox on Instagram, and you can.
Find me Laura at Laura vandercam dot com. This has been the best of both worlds podcasts. Please join us next time for more on making work and life work together.