Are you attempting to work from home with small children? - A behind-the-scenes post from Liz Jennings

It’s a bit embarrassing, but the only childcare advice I can give with any degree of certainty is how to become invisible to your kids in order to get some writing done.

I’ve worked from home for about twenty years now. When we had our first child, I would write while she napped. She was a great napper. Of course, our second was the opposite.

I love my kids, and I love the positive mental health outcomes of getting some work done.

I had to work out ways to find pockets of time in which to think and write.

Here are a few of the activities that helped me get stuff done when my kids were primary-school-age. Perhaps they will help you, too.

In The Home

You will need:
A wipe-clean tablecloth
PVA glue and a brush.

Method: Paint the glue all over the table cloth. It needs to dry in a well ventilated place, so perhaps do this outside.

When it’s dry, pop on some relaxing music and let your kids pick away at the glue, slowly peeling the whole tablecloth clean.

This is great practice for peeling teenage sunburn. Disgusting and satisfying. And it’ll buy you some time.

While they peel, get as much work done as you can.

In the Garden

You will need:
Tiny scissors, like nail scissors

If you can trust your kids, give them the tiny scissors and let them cut the grass all around the edges of your garden. Explain they must cut only grass.

Be prepared that they may cut the odd flower.

Don’t go mad at them if they do cut a flower or two. You got some work done, didn’t you? Put the flower in a vase and be happy.

Fencing off some time…

You will need:
A big DIY paint brush
A bowl or bucket of water

Set your kids up with the brush and the bucket and tell them they can paint the fence and all the bricks they can reach on the house. (Make sure you haven’t left a ladder outside!)

Now, quick, work! Who knows how long you’ve got?

The grass really is greener, and bluer, and…

You will need:
watercolour paints
water
small brushes

Give them the paints and brushes and let them paint the grass and leaves in as many colours as they wish. Let them paint the flowers, if you don’t mind. My daughter once spent a whole morning painting all the dandelions blue. I got a whole short story written: we both felt great!

None of the above will be remotely relaxing for you if you are a proper gardener. For me, getting some writing done and staying sane mattered more.

However you’re working this week, if you have small children then my heart goes out to you: it’s not easy to balance kids and work at the best of times, let alone when under lockdown.

One thing I have learned is that, little by little, the midst of all the muddle, work somehow gets done if you just keep chipping away in small doses.

Lastly, try not to get fixated on only meeting your own targets, because that will lead to frustration. One day, when you’re stuck in the office, you may well look back on this time with great fondness.

Take care, take heart, keep going and keep well, Lx