Juggling My Way Through The Day

 I am sure this is a very common problem but I am really struggling at the moment. How do you cope with entertaining the children and keeping the house? This sounds daft now that I'm typing it but I bet I'm not alone. I'm hoping by typing this it will shed new light on an old problem...

I have Chaos, who is 20 months and Squish, who is 7 months at home with me all day. The Big One is 12 and at school. My husband takes him in the morning and I leave to pick him up at 2.30pm.
(This is how much I typed between Chaos going to bed and Squish waking up. Not long enough for a cuppa even!)
Both boys sleep for about 2 hours and rarely at the same time. This causes a problem if I want to take them anywhere, like playgroup. It is NEVER worth keeping Chaos up as he is horrific with no sleep! Squish tends to sleep from 9-11 while Chaos goes down about 11-1pm. Then we have time for lunch before the school run. That's it, pretty much every day. 
Chaos is pretty bright and needs occupying nearly all the time. As Squish is getting bigger he also needs more interaction. With them sleeping alternately I am on the go all day from 5.30am when Squish wakes up until 7pm when they both go to bed. 
Trying to combine this daily routine with keeping the house habitable is proving almost impossible. I feel like I am not doing anything very well. If I leave the housework it just doesn't get done and the place is disgusting in 2 days. If I try to do it with Chaos he will switch off the hoover, run off with the dustpan or make a mess of things I have just put away. He needs me to spend time with him, they both do. 


It occured to me last night, maybe I should organise my day like a school day. At certain times we do certain things like 7.30am Breakfast, quick tidy up and go for a walk at 9am with the dog. Have a drink and snack when we get back, read a book then sleep. I don't know if that would work and I don't know if I'm disciplined enough to carry it off, to be honest. I just thought if I influence the timing of their normal activities, maybe I can manage to get them to sleep at the same time. That would allow me about 2 hours blogging housework time a day, which would be great. As much as  I love them, it will also give me a bit of child free time each day as 10 minutes is shit, quite honestly!


I think I shall have a go and see how I get on. I would love to hear if you have the same problems juggling your day or if you have found a way to make it all work. Any hints or tips gratefully received. I have made this a blog hop so we can share ideas.