So my husband recently took a job that will allow him to stay home. This is going to be a big adjustment for our family because we are used to him being gone from 6am to 6pm or later Monday-Friday and working some Saturdays. He will have to work 8-5 from home, with whatever breaks he deems necessary. I work part-time from home in the mornings and we school late morning/early afternoon, then afternoon cleaning and making supper etc, so our day is already pretty full. One of the problems I see happening is that our dining room is right next to the office space (with no wall). He will work in the office and we work in the dining room. Also, I kind of like my time during the day, and the routine we've already created. And when our days go a little slow, it's always nice to look forward to daddy coming home.. which he will already be home, so there's nothing to break up our day there. I'm also worried about separating our time.. it's going to be so easy for him to keep working past his work hours.. and it will be easy for me to possibly distract him during the day :s . We have to learn to respect each other's time and routine. There will be lots of positives too I'm sure. I mean we will have to learn to work together as a team, something we haven't really learned to do on a daily basis because there's never been a real need. I'm sure learning how to do that every day will strengthen our relationship... or we will just drive each other mad. And we will have more family time and decreased gas cost. With all of that said, i do believe this job is an answer to prayer and what God is leading us to do. Im bracing my self for change. I'm just a little nervous about the whole thing. Do any of you ladies have hubbies home during the day? How would it change your family dynamic if you did? It may not effect some of you the way i know it will me (affect/effect??) but it will be a huge change for us. REALLY. Just wanted to vent and maybe get a little feedback.
Ummm well, my hubby is not home during the day, does not work from home, etc, but I can tell you if he was here there is no way anything would get done either by the kids, him or myself. When he has a day off and we are scheduled to do school it either doesn't happen or I have to make him stay in bed till we are done. I don't have any advice.. I know it couldnt' work in our home.. esp with an open floor plan between the dining room and office. We would have to figure a way for the office and where ever we were doing school to be seperated.. and sound proof.
I used to, but I was the one working most of the day. He spent a good part of the day with kids and he worked part-time when I was with the kids. We were in different parts of the house, but I liked being able to easily contact him. I would change where you work. Kids are noisy and I'm guessing he won't be able to work well with lots of noise. Can you go someplace else in the house? Dh and I were usually on different floors.
Yes we could do school somewhere else.. living room or one of the bedrooms. that's possible and probably what we'd have to end up doing
We spent a year during preschool age with dh working from home. I had a preschool at home with 3 other children here during half a day. It worked out well for us because we had an office where dh could go and close the door and claimed he could not really hear us with the hallway between our areas. That was great since he had many phone conferences a day. It was great at that point in our lives because he could take a break during the day for a few minutes and spend a little play time with ds. It will require flexibility with scheduling breaks and such.
Freddy was home a lot when we homeschooled because of his work schedule and being semi retired. He was a lot of help and did most of the science with the girls. He was not having to work or sleep during the day, since he works weekends only, so that made a big difference.
My husband started working from home full-time ion late October. Surprisingly, while there have definitely been some adjustments, they have largely *not* been about school, but more about meals and household management. For the first two weeks, we were all in the same small room (us doing school and him working) because we were sharing a computer. Yikes. I really have no idea how he got anything done, because we just "kept on truckin'." Then he got his own computer and moved into a different room. He also started interacting more with the boys' schoolwork. Each day, the younger boys check with him for a good time and read something aloud to him. Our oldest sometimes can get help from him if I'm busy with one of the other children. Now, last week, as a nod to coming hot weather, we moved his desk into a room adjacent to the room where we do school so we have to cool fewer rooms. So far, it's been two days of schoolwork and it's gone all right. Having those months of separation helped. I will say, when my DH needs to make an important call -- he often goes to find a quiet place (sometimes outside is quieter than anywhere inside), and sometimes some people just have to put off practicing piano, etc., and do quiet things until the call is over. So, in all, the homeschool and dad working at home adjustment was much smoother than the household chores/meals/etc adjustment. When (if?) that gets worked out, I'll let you know
I think this may be where we will have issues. Not sure how we are gonna manage that part of it either
My DH works from home, but is not always AT home. Much of his job is meetings with people in the community. I don't like it when he is home during our school day. He interrupts when he needs to use the printer or if he just thinks of something he feels the need to talk about. He has gotten better (after a couple of gentle reminders that we really needed to get on with our school day) and tends to use our bedroom as a place to make calls or work on his laptop. It works for us because it has to, but honestly, I liked it better when he went to an office each day.
Well, I'm hoping I like this better because his previous schedule was soo time consuming. And he was constantly having to work overtime and fill in for people and he also has a part time job aside from that one, so it gets to be strenuous. I think the key is for us to be able to sit down and talk and let the other know what our expectations are. But last night after hubby got home, DS and I had to finish up a spelling test and a reading words list (because we played around all day long). Hubby did well for the first few minutes, went around the kitchen (making supper.. good man) quietly. but that passed and soon he was looking over Travin's shoulder and talking to him, which of course goofing off with dad was more fun than doing reading with mom. I didn't say anything last night but when we do have that talk about our expectations, I'll bring it up. It's hard enough keeping DS focused without daddy helping along. :roll:
My DH doesn't have set hours at all now (and really didn't when he did work in an office). He works whenever those he needs to meet with are available--whatever time of the day (within reason, of course!). He works for a non-profit organization and is often attending meetings, fundraisers, or other events on nights and weekends. In that respect, I'm glad he's around some during the day. But it does make schooling a bit harder. As long as your DH is cooperative with your needs, it'll work fine. The only big issue I have is the amount of STUFF that accumulates with working at home. We have stacks of applications, printouts of potential donors, pledge cards, etc. everywhere! I repurposed an old dresser as a place to corral all the endless paper, but DH tends to leave it where ever he finished with it. He will clean it up if I ask, but sometimes I just do it myself.
Hubbie being home 24/7 has been a big adjustment here. The truth is it takes a LOT of communication between both; needs, expectations, etc. But, I've also realized that sometimes the relationship between father and kids is more important than learning those math facts that day. It's a balance. Good Luck! And if you find the answer, let us know!
I worked from home while homeschooling, and had an elderly person to care for in the house at the same time. Now years later, we have a retired DH at home. If you do not have a large house, a garage, or a basement, then you may need to reconsider using some of your home's spaces in a unconventional manner to allow for separate work areas and storage. If a house is small but you have a nicely sized back yard, many people have purchased small wooden sheds or even did a rent to own on them and used them as a small office. A chunk of carpet few rolls of insulation and a small window unit AC can make them into a nice office. A phone line and extention cord can be run to them in pvc or underground wire can be used and tapped into an outside outlet assuming amps and overloads are taking into consideration. Just be sure the electrical is up to par. We had a quite heavy extention cord rated for lots of amps and with a ground fault and circuit protector built in to a shed years back. All was well. A small window unit will not even run much in such a small space. With wifi, and cordless phones, you might not even need a phone cord, just a little ac power for a light and ac or heater.
My husband and I chatted about this just last night when one of our sons told us he wished Daddy could work from home all the time. We only have one vehicle right now and his commute is 50 min to one office or and hour and twenty to the other so when someone has a dr appt he works from home so I can have the van. I told him that I wouldn't really care to have him working from home. I would prefer he worked closer to home but nothing would ever get done if he worked from home all the time. If he did work from home he'd have to squirrel away up in our bedroom so we could all pretend each other didn't exist during the day. :lol:
I totally relate to this. DH works shift work so is off sometimes on weekdays. When this happens he has the tendency to pop in to tell me something as it occurs to him, print something out, etc. Much as I love the guy, it proved to be extremely difficult to get DD focused after each interruption. The entire class day was longer, and it was really frustrating to me. I talked to him about it and requested that he not interrupt unless it was time-sensitive, and that's helped a bit. DD finally pasted a sign on the door that said "do not interrupt!" I thought that was funny.
Here's a thought -- I get the issue of interruptions. Frankly, it works the other way, too. The kids are all (for the moment) busy writing/reading/whatever, and I have just one little thing to quickly ask DH...but then, I'm interrupting him. So, as silly as it sounds, I email him. A LOT. I figure, I don't have to worry about remembering to tell him later, and he can check it when it's a good time. It also helps me decide if it's worth interrupting him over (can it wait), and it ALSO provides a better model for the kids. As I said, our younger children read to him daily; however, part of that assignment is checking in with Dad first to see if it's a good time to read to him, or when will be better. So I guess, in the end, we're all in process, working on not interrupting each other.
I've worked from home for almost 20 years, and we set things up specifically so that our children could study from home without impacting my work. Here are what I would say are the more important lessons learned: 1) I had an office built in my garage. In today's prices, it cost about $8,000, and consuming half a 2-car garage does reduce the house's valuation. Nonetheless, it has been worth it. I'm not in the main part of the house, so I'm quite isolated from any noise. (In my case, I convinced my then-employer to pay for building the office. The pay-back, versus using an executive suite, was about six months.) Incidentally, I designed the office such that the garage door slides over that part of the office ceiling. Also, there's room between my office wall and the garage door to store bikes and other similar items. With a little thought and planning, you'd be surprised how efficiently you can use the space. 2) I established a clear protocol for the children wanting to come to my office. They must approach quietly, knock on the door, and wait for me to answer. If I'm on the phone and don't answer, they knock a second time and then leave. If I can answer, obviously, I do so. For your husband, the big temptation is going to be to pop into his office at midnight when he thinks of something that needs doing. Most people think that working from home tempts the employee to work fewer hours. I've found that quite the opposite is true, because no time is needed to drop by the office. He needs to establish some rules of his own in this regard - otherwise he'll spend more and more time in his office.
