SAHM or Freelance Editor?

Working from home often means that people don't understand that you are 'working'. You get telephone calls trying to sell you something (rather than buy your services), even worse your mum/sister/MIL/best friend thinks she can call for a 'chat' at any time. My OH also thinks nothing of expecting me to do the cleaning, washing, shopping, nipping to the post office to collect parcels, etc, etc. (okay he expected me to do that when I worked 9-5 too - he was bitterly disappointed back then as well).

Then of course there is trying to work when children are there - as clients believe that you are on the end of the phone, waiting for their call, at their convenience, when ever they decide they need to talk to you. My son's regular refrain is 'can I talk mummy?' repeated at the top of his voice as I move desperately around the house to avoid him AND concentrate on the call. Afterwards I always berate myself for not offering to call back. I was reassured on reading this however I don't think I'll be resorting to this.

Handy tips on motivation and the long weekend

In my search for motivation - you may have guessed I've spent a bit of time 'playing around' on the Internet (basically avoiding the work I need to get motivated about).

I've discovered that I'm not the only one out there: Lorna and Tamara from Freelance Parent have recently blogged about it too.

Bootstrapper has '50 ways to create a motivational workspace' and Cheryl Wright has detailed instructions on how to motivate yourself to achieve your goals.

It seems there are a few others out there with motivational problems!

My distractions this week have been: searching the web for posts on motivation :-), adding blogs to my bloglines account, Facebook, knitting a jumper for my god daughter, making an Easter hat for the toddler, playing on our new Wii and finally cleaning the house for my in-laws visit this weekend! However there has been some work done and I'm sure (I hope) that my motivation will return with a vengeance once I wave them off on Monday night.

Happy long (very, very, long) weekend - whether you are working, playing or biting your tongue over the amount of chocolate being shovelled into your kids.

Take a break!

Being freelance can sometimes be lonely. You don't have the contact with others that you would have if you were employed in an office (in some cases that can be a good thing :-) ), you sometimes don't even get outside during daylight hours and even Facebook can be lonely if none of your friends are online (although it's an indispensable and addictive lifeline when they are). I only work part time, having a 3 year old at home, but with nursery closed and lots of deadlines I've been shut off from the outside world for what seems like forever!

So yesterday I tentatively took up one of my new years resolutions and headed to the gym for an hour before starting work - and realised only visiting 3 times in 2 months has really affected my fitness levels! Feeling a little braver this morning I took the plunge and ventured to the local toddler group to reconnect with people I haven't seen for weeks and give allow my 3 year old to run around (in the hope that he sleeps through tonight - still not luck on that front). Having had that break, and a chance to talk to actual people (rather than by email and instant message), I was able to concentrate on the tasks in hand this afternoon and I was a much calmer mummy.

It's made me realise that I need to add a few new years resolutions to my list - to make a few more coffee mornings with local mums, chat when I do the nursery pick up, make my local SfEP meetings (I made one last year) as meeting up with other freelance editors and proofreaders is always beneficial and most importantly to take a break every so often (with or without the chocolate bar!).