Three weeks of travel can certainly throw you for a loop. One one hand, I was able to attend two conferences and attend a brand event, so business-wise, they were good trips. On the other hand, I’m internally off-balance after traveling three weeks in a row.

Good and bad. There were plenty of good things about these trips and I don’t regret for a second going on any of them. But, as is true with much in life, with the good comes the bad.

The Good

• I was very lucky to have been able to take my family along for both conferences. Though I was mostly attending the conferences, I did get to see them in the mornings and nights. This helped ease the “miss you” moments for both the kids and myself.
• I was able to meet new people, have great conversations, and learn from all three trips.
• I had time to reflect on several things and take advantage of some quiet time to be able to just think.
• I was able to learn more about this brand and find ways we can possibly work together in the future.
• I came home from the most recent trip feeling more calm and full of ideas, rather than feeling just tired. I’m still tired, but the feeling was lessened.

The Bad

• My routine was thrown off and is still off.
• I’m still catching up on work.
• My family missed me, and I missed them.
• My daughter, in particular, was affected by the most recent trip and shed some tears in class because she missed me.
• My head is spinning a bit from being in many places within such a short time, but in a good kind of way.

None of this is extreme or unmanageable. My girl’s classroom situation really affected me the day I received notice from her teacher. But, after talking with her about it and thinking it through, I realized that at least she was able to express her thoughts. I explained to her that it’s absolutely normal to feel that way and that I too missed her. She also realizes these trips are part of my work and describes them as such. I feel it’s good for her to see this side of me in addition to the other roles she sees me play at home.

There are months where I go without any travel, so in the end, all things even out. How do you balance out the good and the bad of business travel?

Photo: Highways Agency/Flickr

When it comes to work-life balance, we try many tools to help us balance our time. From planning meals and chore schedules, to sticking to a social media routine and creating a daily work-flow schedule, we often focus on the planning tools.

But, what about other resources?

I’ve often said to many, that one of the biggest maintaining balance “tools” I have is my husband. And, I don’t mean I use him to delegate tasks, either. More so, I mean that he offers something that all of the planning and productivity tools can’t. Support.

Yes, he offers support by being an equal parent and partner. Of course, he shares the household and parenting responsibilities. This, in and of itself, is a great help in maintaining balance in our lives. However, on a personal level, he offers support…to me, as his wife.

He supports my social media consulting business, my blogging, my goals, and my aspirations. Without that support, it would be much more difficult to accomplish what I do on a daily basis. And, I still have so much more to accomplish.

Imagine, though, if he did not support me. I would go through a daily battle against my parenting duties, my household duties, and my work…and have an added layer of stress because the person with whom I share my life does not support aspects of it.

I can’t even imagine.

So, I’m grateful that he does provide support – both tangible and emotional. I often joke with him that he is my business adviser. In so many ways…he really is.

Who helps you with that type of support?

What a hectic week so far. Work is super busy. Of course, the home life is always hectic.

I find that more often than not, I have an inner battle going on. Part of me knows that I can’t possibly keep up with everything – home, work, husband, daughter, myself, parents, etc.

Yet, the other half, for whatever unknown ridiculous reason, has it in her head that she should be able to keep up with everything. Not just should, but MUST.

It’s insane.

I realized the other day that this is probably due to years of brainwashing from my mother. And, when I say brainwashing, I mean that in the nicest way possible. Obviously, she did not set out to corrupt my mind. But, through example, it happened.

You see, my mother was a stay at home mom – way before that was even a term; in fact, I believe the term at the time was “housewife.”

Since she stayed home with us until I was about 12 or so, I watched her keep the house in an impeccable state of cleanliness. She had no clutter, no baskets of laundry just waiting to be folded, no dust, and always had dinner on the table when my father came home from work.

Even when she did start working, she still managed to come home from work, and get right to the kitchen. Maybe it had something to do with our Puerto Rican culture. But, whatever it was, it still amazes me how she did it.

I struggle on a daily basis to be able to just put a quick dinner together. To spend some time with my baby girl after a long day at work. Don’t even mention trying to squeeze in some time for the husband.

I think (well actually, it was brought to my attention by the husband recently) that because I grew up seeing her manage so well, I now have these extremely high (and false) expectations of myself. The fact that she often talked with me about having to be a “good wife,” probably added on to it as well. Let me give you an example of something I grew up hearing. Verbatim, my mom used to say, “You have to learn how to cook and clean, because when you get older and get married, you’ll need to take care of your house, husband, and children.”

Though I’m extremely grateful that my mother taught me how to cook and properly clean, hearing this growing up and seeing her manage the “super mom” role well, has resulted in me trying to achieve the same. It’s actually quite frustrating.

How do you manage to keep up? Do you find you have false expectations for yourself?

As a full-time working mom, it’s very hard for me to keep up with the household duties. I’ve posted before about the expectations – false no doubt – that I’ve set for myself.

Elizabeth over at Career & Kids touched on the subject recently, when a friend of hers realized there’s not enough time in the week. As she mentions, when you’re working all week, you want to use the weekend to spend time with the family. That is when I’d like to take a trip to the zoo, the park, or sometimes it’s just a matter of the “must” trips – like grocery shopping that needs to be done.

What can working moms do to manage the housework?

I’m not sure I have the answer just yet, but I AM trying something new.

I’ve set up a weekly chore schedule and broken down the housework to a little each day – there’s even a day off!

Here’s my schedule:

• Sunday: clean bathrooms
• Monday: wash laundry
• Tuesday: fold laundry
• Wednesday: sweep & mop
• Thursday: vacuum
• Friday: OFF day
• Saturday: change bed sheets

Plus, every day is de-clutter day, since this can be done simultaneously with the other chores. That means, putting away toys, clearing the day’s mail, and other small tasks. The chores scheduled on the weekend can be done quickly in the morning before heading out for the day.

To keep track of my schedule, I’ve printed out Hannah Keeley’s Total Mom Chore Chart, but any calendar will do.

I’m hoping this will help keep me on track and make things a bit more manageable. I’ve just made my list this week, so I’m only starting to put it into practice.

How do you manage your housework?

Photo by Jane Ring

Photo by Suzanne Edge

Facebook. Twitter. MySpace. Plurk. Identi.ca? With so many social media tools and networks out there, it’s hard not to get overwhelmed. How do you choose which to use? How do you keep up with them all? How much time will it take out of your already busy life?

Through trial and error, I’ve developed a daily routine to keep up with the various social media accounts I use. When I was working full-time outside the home, I had to really use my time wisely since I could not be engaged in social medial all day, but still wanted to maintain a social media presence. As you know, it’s not enough to just have an account, you have to actually use it and be “present” for your social media efforts to work.

Let me share a sample schedule of how I used social media when I was working full-time. In the mornings, I had the benefit of an empty home after my husband left for work and dropped off my daughter at day-care. Since I started work a little later than him, this meant that I had about an hour each morning to do my social media/blog work before I had to get myself ready. In this hour, I created the following social media routine and would do most (and sometimes all) of the following.

Image from webtreats on Flickr

Sample Social Media Routine

• Open up my browser and open a tab for each of these sites: ping.fm, myspace, facebook, plurk, twitter, gmail, google reader, and delicious. As I completed my tasks for each site, I would close the tab and move on to the next.
• Post a status update using ping.fm.
• MySpace: Even then, MySpace was slowly being phased out of my social media routine, but since I (still) have some real-life friends and family that use it, I would check in every morning. It was a very quick check of messages, comments, and friends’ status updates.
• Facebook: I would login and respond to any comments or messages sent to me. I would post a “Happy Birthday!” message for those with birthdays that day and possibly leave a comment or two on others’ profiles. If I had something to promote – a contest or my latest post – I would do so via my fan page and/or group. Of course, I’d also take care of any requests that were waiting for action – friend requests, even invites, page suggestions, etc.
• Plurk: Though not a common microblogging platform, it’s one I was exploring at the time and continue to participate in since I’ve made some connections that are not elsewhere. Again, I would quickly check in on any replies to my updates and try to comment on one or two people’s updates.
• Twitter: Similar to the rest, I would login to Twitter and be sure to respond to any @ replies or DMs I received overnight. I would also review new followers and follow-back appropriately (or not). I would then leave this tab open since I would often interact with various other folks that were up early like me.
• E-mail: I use gmail for my e-mail, which has the ability to star items you need to come back to and label your messages for finding later. Simple Mom has a nice system she uses for managing her inbox that I try to follow. I would definitely take about 10 minutes each morning to check urgent items and clear out the “junk” so that it didn’t clutter up my inbox.
• Google Reader: I didn’t always have time to get to reading some blog posts – it just depended on how much time I spent on the other tabs. But, some days, I’d be able to read a few posts from those blogs you “must” read each day.
• Delicious: Since I have the delicious plugin installed on Firefox, I’d only need to open this up if I saw there was new activity in my network or if anyone had sent me a link. But, in browsing resources bookmarked by those in my network, I’d often find a great article or tip or even a blog post idea.

Photo by Jen R

Each morning I’d go through my routine and get a great head start on my day – social media wise, anyway. Then, during the day while I was at work, I would monitor twitter, facebook, and e-mail using my smart phone. Of course, I wasn’t always on it. But if I took a quick break from my desk and especially during lunch time, I’d be able to update my status (again using ping.fm) and check in on comments.

In the evenings, after dinner and the nightly bed-time/bath routine for baby girl, I’d take another hour (sometimes two depending on how busy the husband was) to go through the same routine. However, I would focus less on checking comments/messages and more so on clearing out e-mail and writing a blog post.

Wondering what I do now that I’m not working full-time? The same. Though I don’t always have the house to myself in the mornings anymore, I still take a half-hour to an hour each morning and use the same social media routine. The days that baby girl goes to preschool, I do this routine after I’ve dropped her off. The days she’s home with me, I use the time when she’s eating breakfast and watching her morning cartoons. If I’m lucky and she’s overslept, I go through my routine before she wakes up.

Through the rest of the day, I periodically check in on social media and e-mail. As I mentioned in a previous post, I tend to login again mid-day and in the evening. I try to follow my social media routine each time, but depending on other projects/tasks I have to get done, I may cut my routine in half during those times.

Seem like a lot to-do? Keep in mind that you don’t have to have accounts for all the sites that I do. You will find those that serve your needs the best. Truthfully, though, once you get into a routine, it will become habit and not be so overwhelming.

Additional tips:

• Always answer @ replies, DMs, comments, etc. for the various networks you belong to. It’s so frustrating when you’re trying to talk to someone and they ignore you, isn’t it? Don’t ignore.
• Catch what you can while logged on. You won’t be able to read every single status update for every single network you belong to.
• Retweet interesting statuses, share good information, and useful links/resources. Your readers will appreciate it and will come to know that you have valuable information.

Have you already created your social media routine?

Disclosure: In conjunction with hosting this giveaway, I will receive two months of personal assistant service from TaskUs.com and a 2-night stay at Hyatt Place.

What does every busy working parent need? Besides more sleep, of course – that’s not something I can help you with.

Take another guess. Go ahead….give up? Oh ok.

Personal assistant. Am I right?

I know there’s been many times I’ve said, “If only I had a personal assistant to…” – you fill in the blank. From keeping up with work, the house, finances, our families, and the many many responsibilities we have every day, maintaining your sanity can be hard at times. We work hard to achieve work-life balance in our lives and we need every little bit of help we can get. In fact, a recent national study conducted by Hyatt Place found that the number of Americans struggling with work-life balance has nearly doubled to 71% since 2006.

It seems that one of the reasons we’re having a harder time finding our balance is that we’re no longer splitting up our various roles. The average 2010 American is instead multitasking all day, every day. Some interesting stats from the study:

• 83% of Americans said they often take care of work matters from home
• 59% stated that they often handle personal matters at work
• 62% of respondents said they are constantly multitasking
• On average, someone working from home is doing five tasks simultaneously

Sound familiar?

To help with your busy multitasking life, Hyatt Place is currently giving away 2 months of virtual personal assistant service to 20 people. The service will be provided by TaskUs.com and you can enter through April 9.

But, you can enter for an even better giveaway right here. In addition to the 2 months of virtual assistance, you can also win a 2-night stay at a Hyatt Place hotel of your choice. Oh, and, two of you will win!

Giveaway

Two readers will win a 2-night Hyatt Place hotel stay and 2 months virtual personal assistant service from TaskUs.com

How to Enter

If you’d like to enter this contest for a 2-night stay/2 months service package, simply leave a comment below and tell us why you need a personal assistant.

For extra entries:

1. Tweet about this contest with a link back to this post and include @modernmami in your tweet. You must leave a separate comment with a link to your tweet for your entry to count.
2. Become a fan of ModernMami.com on Facebook and leave a comment on this post with your Facebook name.
3. Subscribe to this blog via email and leave a comment with the email you used to subscribe. (You can use the email field to do this instead of putting your email in the comment if you prefer.)
4. Subscribe on friendfeed and leave a comment with your friendfeed ID.
5. Write a blog post on your own blog sharing with your readers why you need a personal assistant and make sure to link back to this contest page in your post. Leave a comment with your post link.

All entries must be in by Wednesday, April 7 at 11:59 pm EST. Make sure to leave a separate comment for each entry. The winners will be chosen using Random.org and will be notified via email. (Please be sure to provide a valid email address with your entry.

Additional Contest Information

• There are no blackout dates for the Hyatt Place hotel stay.
• The TaskUs.com personal assistant service hours must be used by August.
• Official rules for the nationwide Hyatt Place sweepstakes can be found on the contest website.

I spent most of my time offline this weekend. I did check in on email and some social media accounts periodically, but didn’t really do too much. I think I tweeted once during the last two days and answered a total of two emails. And no actual “work” was completed – no blog post drafts, no client work – nothing.

This got me thinking, do the majority of people take the weekend “off” or do they work? I know for those who hold traditional 9-5 jobs, they take the weekend off – for the most part. But for those who are freelancers, bloggers, or work from home in some other capacity, it seems like we’re always working. Even if we’re just keeping up with networking and marketing ourselves through social media, we’re always “on” and rarely unplug.

I have yet to decide which I prefer – keeping up with work over the weekend or unplugging and keeping work for the weekdays. Each have their benefits, don’t you think?

Benefits of Working on the Weekend

• Can keep up with time-sensitive events.
• Get a head start on work for the next week.
• Keep ideas going for projects you’re working on.

Benefits of Unplugging on the Weekend

• Can fully dedicate yourself to your family.
• Provides you with a mental rest so you can rejuvenate yourself.
• Able to have fun and do those activities you can’t get to during the work week.

Your Turn

I’d like to hear what you think. What do you see as the benefits for one or the other? Which do you prefer to do on the weekends?

This is a Sponsored Post written by me on behalf of Purex. All opinions are 100% mine.

Hello, hello. It is that time of the week again. Viernes! Friday! And, it’s definitely TGIF for me. I’m looking forward to having some fun family time this weekend, though I was grateful to return to a “normal” routine this past week as I had no travel.

For today’s Viernes Social, I am sharing a new video. And let me tell you…this vlogging thing is interesting. But, I’m trying. Hopefully I’ll start to feel more comfortable with it soon enough.

Anyway, this video is about the Purex 3-in-1 Laundry Sheet. As you may know, I’ve been a Purex Insider for a few months now and have been trying out the sheets on my laundry. Take a look at the video below to hear all about my experience in using the laundry sheets. And ladies, you’ll appreciate the story about my husband and the grocery shopping.

If you want to try out the sheet for yourself, you can get a free sample by visiting the Purex blog. Oh, and check out this other video from Purex; it made me laugh.

Have you used the Purex laundry sheets? Do you feel they save you time and/or money? If you haven’t tried them, maybe you can share with us your pet peeve about doing laundry.

Like many mothers today, I can no longer afford the exciting life of a Stay At Home Mom. While I tremendously enjoyed each and every day I had with my son … waking up when we wanted, breastfeeding when he was ready, giggling, reading, and playing all day … life must now adjust.

I must admit, while I am excited to return to the world outside of my small home, ready to meet new friends and have an office to go to, I am also really nervous. This change has happened all so sudden for me and there are a few things I would like to get in order in the next … ooh … 10 hours.

Many mothers have walked this path before, and many more will continue to do it in the weeks/months/years to come, each having their own fears, worries, concerns, and dreams. These are just a few of the topics on my heart today as I begin to weed through my wardrobe searching for work clothes that fit my new motherly figure:

Childcare: How well will my child be taken care of while I am away? I am fortunate enough to be one of the lucky moms who live very close to their child’s ever-loving grandparents. My mother has lovingly offered to hang out with my son while I am at work (don’t want to say babysit – seems so impersonal). All I have to do is provide her with the cloth diapers, some pumped breast milk, extra clothes, some burp cloths, and a few toys. If I didn’t have her, I don’t think it would be worth it for me to return to work. Seems like the costs wouldn’t really justify it.

Continue to fully breastfeed: I am determined to not let anything come in between my goal of breastfeeding my son until he is ready to stop and weans himself. That means whatever job I have must allow me to take the necessary time and space to pump during his normal feeding time. From my close friends and social networks, I have learned that this is the time many breastfeeding mamas are put in the position to end their feedings early and turn to formula. For me and my son, no job is worth it. He is now only four and a half months old, so pretty soon I will also introduce home-made solid foods to him. Maybe we can work it out so that the solids meals are provided when I am at work. We’ll have to play with that one.

Providing good quality contact time with my baby: Okay, I may be overreacting a little bit. I am only returning to work part-time – in the mornings from 9am – 1pm – but for me, right now, that feels like an eternity. Those first morning giggles and wiggles are the best. I want to try my hardest to ensure that when I come home, I am dedicating some good quality time to him and filling our moments with heart-filled memories.

Maintaining a healthy amount of sleep: Ahhh sleep. I vaguely remember what that word means. I think it was something that used to occur between the hours of 10pm and 6am. Not any more. We have just recently established a fairly regular routine pattern of sleep which is now going to be thrown off just a little. I will basically be losing 3 hours of sleep until I can get little man to bed 3 hours earlier. No more staying up and partying until midnight.

Valuable performance at work: While most of my fears involve leaving the home, I do have one fear about life outside … will I be a good employee? Before I became pregnant, I believe I was a fairly good administrative assistant. I have grown over the years and established a pretty good work ethic. However, at that time I didn’t have the world’s cutest, sweetest, baby on my mind. Will I be able to focus and perform my duties to the best of my abilities? I don’t like to disappoint.

Managing house work: And lastly (purposely last), will I be able to keep up with the house work? My honest answer – I would just very well throw in the towel and say…”who cares…really.” So the laundry piled up a bit, the dirty dishes were not cleaned tonight, life will go on. But I vow not to allow that to be a habit.

What fears, challenges, obstacles and changes do you (or did) face when you head out to work? What have you done to overcome them and make each day work? Was finding that happy balance hard for your family?

I spent most of yesterday (and part of last week) in a rut. The “I have no desire to do anything and would rather sit here like a blob” kind of rut. I’ve also been having head and body aches, which have added to my excuses for not doing anything. I’m not sure which came first – the aches or the blah feeling – or if one caused the other. It’s probably a part of my adjustment from working outside the home to now working at home.

Anyway, my point is not to bore you with details of how I’ve been a downer lately. Instead, I want to take advantage of this and share with you what I plan to do to get out of this rut. In doing so, it’ll help me lay it all out for myself too.

My first step will be to just get up and do something. Now this is going to be the hardest part, since as I mentioned, I don’t actually feel like doing anything. But, I have to force myself. It doesn’t have to be something big like cleaning the bathroom or anything. Something small like putting in a load to wash, doing a few of the dishes, or answering some emails. The point is that after I do the one thing, I’ll a) feel like I accomplished something and b) start a chain reaction. Doing the dishes will probably lead to cleaning up some of the clutter off the counters and wiping them down. Or answering a few emails might inspire a blog post to be written. One thing leads to another and hopefully a few more too.

I also plan to get out of the house a bit more. Normally, I’ve just been taking baby girl to preschool then coming back home and staying here. But, yesterday, I noticed that when I forced myself to go to the store in the evening, I came home with more energy. Well, maybe not energy, but at least some motivation. Being outside and running that small errand got my blood flowing I suppose and I came home wanting to do more.

And finally, I’ll share how I’m feeling with my family more often. Instead of just moping around, I’ll let my husband know what’s going on to help him understand. Just talking it out and hearing it all might help me work it out. I can also talk to my mom, who can give me a good old-fashioned pep talk of “get over it and do something”. Sometimes, it’s what you need to hear.

I suppose we all go through days where we’re just out of it and in a rut. I just can’t let it take over because I’d be putting myself and family in a really bad situation. I know that once I start getting a few things done, I’ll get back into my normal groove.

What do you do when you find yourself in a rut? Do you just ride it out or do you do anything specific to get yourself out of it?

Photo: Michelle Gibson