Welcome to the midpoint (just about!) of the week! My time tracking spreadsheet goes from 5 a.m. Monday morning to 5 a.m. the following Monday. That means that 5 p.m. Thursday is the exact midpoint of the week. I always find this a helpful observation, because whatever the first half of the week looked like, for many people the second half looks a lot different. If you’re pondering your work/life balance, it’s helpful to look at the whole picture.
Anyway, I worked until 5:30 p.m. yesterday, then worked on my puzzle for 30 minutes, serenaded by the 15-year-old’s alto sax lesson. B left at 6 p.m., so I went and hung out with the 5-year-old while he played Roblox. The lesson ended at 6:30, and then I got the kids organized and took 4/5ths of them (minus the 17-year-old) out to Olive Garden to celebrate the 10-year-old’s birthday. This was about a 15 minute drive. We ate from 7-8:15 (it took me a while to figure out that we were supposed to pay at the little tablet at the table; what can I say, it’s been a while since I’ve been to an Olive Garden! But the kids could all get something they liked and my salad and pasta were just fine so yay). Then I drove them all home, arriving 8:30 p.m.
This is normally “in room with no devices” time. But since we had been out to dinner so long I allowed everyone extra time. The 10-year-old called his video gaming friend in CA, and they played together for a bit. I had to help the 17-year-old print something for a competition in a very exact way. Eventually I got the 5-year-old to go to his room, and I read him a story (Bear Snores On) and sat with him until he conked out (at which point he snored on…). I got the 10-year-old into his bed. It was an exciting night because we changed from our old goodnight ritual, which involved 9 quick hugs, 9 quick kisses, a bonus hug, and a bonus kiss. Now we are up to 10! I think we started this when he was 6 or 7. So that was cute…and then I remembered the trash.
This is a Wednesday night thing, and is normally my husband’s chore, but he was gone, so I got the 15-year-old and the two of us dragged three trash cans and two recycling bins (“comingled” week) down to the curb. It was very very cold, but it was nice to have company. I made it back in around 10:15 p.m., worked on the puzzle for 30 minutes and finished (see photo), then got ready for bed 10:45. I was in my bed 11/11:10 and asleep as soon as I hit the pillow.
I woke up at 4:30 but managed to get back to sleep. So then I was up with the alarm at 6:40. I got the 13-year-old up, took my shower, and got her in the van and down to the bus stop. 19 degrees! I came back, woke up the 15-year-old, ate, chatted with B when she showed up, then worked for about 15-20 minutes until it was time to drive the 15-year-old to school. Normally the 17-year-old does this, but he has a “free” first period on “A” days – the upshot is that he goes in an hour later every fourth day. Meaning his brother has to get to school in some other fashion. Since he had to take his alto sax back to school today, I agreed to drive him. We left at 8, and I made it back at 8:22. I got the 17-year-old up and worked in my husband’s office because the cleaners were here doing mine.
I worked straight through from 8:30-12:30, more or less. One fun hour of this was spent looking back through my entire 2024 logs for something I’m writing. The one interruption was a call to the pediatrician’s office (they never did call me back yesterday) to the nurse’s line. I left a message for them with a live person this time and a promise that I would be called back.
I practiced choir music from 12:30-1. My church choir is singing Howells’ An English Mass and it is a beast. I do like Howells, so I guess I’ll be spending a lot of time with him! (A note: I would like “Take Him Earth, for Cherishing” sung at my funeral, maybe with some language changes to “her,” but it needs to be sung well, so likely with a small professional chamber choir). I did some more work from 1-2 (with a small interruption to talk to the nurse- booking a visit for my kid for tomorrow, and heat up leftovers in the microwave; I ate at my desk), then did a Before Breakfast podcast interview from 2-2:30. I was really glad this one happened because it had been rescheduled from last week when this person was evacuated from her house in Los Angeles. Very scary – she and her family are back and all right. I dealt with the sound files from 2:30-2:45, then put on my exercise clothes.
I did my combo treadmill/strength workout upstairs. This involves running 2 miles on the treadmill in 4-5 minute spurts, and then doing various strength/resistance exercises in the interludes. It’s less boring than trying to run miles on a treadmill. Also, I listened to Kathleen Paley’s Minimalish Mom podcast episode on travel points hacking. At 3:25 p.m. I changed and freshened up, then chatted with B and the 5-year-old, who were in the kitchen. At 3:45 I went to my office with the intention of working, but B went to go get the 10-year-old from the bus stop, so the 5-year-old wound up with me, and so we hung out for a little bit. She was back in a few minutes and they went up to do Legos, and so I decided to post this before getting back to figuring out what people will want to know about how I spent the 8784 hours of 2024. (Normally a year has 8760 hours, but it was a leap year.) I spent more than one of those 8784 hours waiting in line for the Haunted Mansion at Disney. Good times.
I hope your time tracking is going well! Here’s the past day in log form.
Wednesday
5 pm work
5:30 puzzle
6 hangout H/video, check S
6:30 kids ready, to Olive Garden
7 Olive Garden/A’s b-day
7:30 Olive Garden/A’s b-day
8 Olive Garden, home
8:30 kids, J printing, etc.
9 kids, H ready, stories, out
9:30 A down, kids, trash!!
10 trash (S), puzzle
10:30 puzzle, ready bed
11 in bed/sleep
Thursday
4:30 up, bathroom, sleep
6:30 6:40 up, R, shower
7 get R’s stuff, van, S
7:30 b-fast, B chat, work
8 drive S, home
8:30 work (some boys)
9 work
9:30 work
10 work
10:30 snack, work
11 work (page through logs)
11:30 work (logs)
12 work
12:30 music practice
1 work, book doc visit, lunch
1:30 work
2 work (BB)
2:30 work/files, ready, run
3 weights/run (2.0), change/freshen up
3:30 chat BP/H, H entertain
4 work
If you’re still doing surveys on how participants make use of the time in the evenings, Ms. Laura Vanderkam, I can tell you that I’ve basically not wasted time in the evenings since Day 2.
I think what usually happens is that the really severe time-wasting incidents that I incur during the year tend to take place outside of the week that we do The Challenge.
Yukun, have you thought of continuing time tracking throughout the year? I find that just knowing I’ll have to write down what I did ensures I make better use of my time!
I have tracked time throughout the year since 4 years ago and partially tracked time in the year since 7 years ago, Frank. I would like to discuss it in detail with you, but I’ll need to have your contact info.
Here is me leaving my contact info, but I cannot guarantee that my comment will show once I leave my contact info.
Phone: 403 3122831
Email: [email protected]
What a sweet bedtime ritual with the “quick” hugs and kisses that increases with age. I wish I’d thought of that when my kiddos were a bit younger. (I think my teen might die of embarrassment if I tried it now.)
@Elisabeth – it is really sweet! I imagine he’ll stop at some point but we shall see how long we can go!
Something I’m noticing today is how much I jump around from thing to thing. I don’t have ADHD (that I know of) or anything similar but I just think of something and do it here and there. I don’t know but maybe some time-blocking or other similar thing would be helpful. I have just never gotten into a groove post semi-retirement. It used to be that my workday was central then it was rather obvious what needed to happen before and after work