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Monday, March 12, 2012

How to Make Work-from-Home Work for Your Family ? Life As Mom

Unless you?ve got a nanny, a housekeeper, a chauffeur, and a chef, it?s hard to manage a home and family?and still keep a smile on your face. But, it?s worth trying. Because nobody wants a crabby mom.

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Moms have always ?worked? at home. They just haven?t always been monetarily compensated for doing so. However, it?s becoming an ever-increasing way for families to make ends meet.

Today, Life as MOM contributor, Prerna Malik shares suggestions on working from home.

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In my last post over here at Life as Mom, I?d talked about how working from home is still work and the discussion that resulted from it in the comments was A-mazing. I loved how all of you shared your own work-at-home journeys and what being a WAHM involved.

So, today, I thought about sharing how when you?re working from home, you need to make it work for your family.

Here are a few things that have worked for me, considering that I also work with my husband as co-worker **smiling**

1. Invite Your Family Into Your Office

Whether you have an actual home office or not, you need to invite your family occasionally into your workspace. Let them see your vision board, your goals, your business plan, the raving reviews from clients. Your workspace as a work-at-home mother is testimony to the hard work that you put in day and night to make money and fulfill dreams.

So, whether you work from your kitchen table or a separate office, let your kids and family see your work. Share your?victories, laugh over glitches and celebrate milestones.

2. Have a Take-Your-Kids-to Work-Day

This is a really fun way to help children understand your professional lifestyle. For a few hours once a month, ?take? your kids to work with you. Let them bring their preferred activity to keep them busy but let them work in the same space as you. With older kids, you can even get them to actually help you with things, like typing out a draft or making a presentation. Keep it for a few hours and don?t pack in heavy-duty stuff like a client meeting via Skype or intensive research for that period.

3. Explain What You Actually Do

Finally and most importantly, when your family asks you what you do, don?t just say, ?I work?. That?s not gonna help them understand your ?work?.

Describe your work. Do you plan events for clients? Share what goes into that. Do you write articles for websites? Talk about how you research a topic, draft an outline, approach and find sources instead of just saying, ?I write.?

Keep them in the loop about meetings, deadlines, project work. Help your family know what you do.

Working from home can be a fun, interesting, liberating and exciting journey. You get to set your own hours, determine how much money you can make, find your own niche, choose the people you work with and for, and do what you love the most. But at the end of the day, you work with your family around you and so, it is essential you make working from home work for them just as well as it does for you.

How do you make work from home work for your family?

Want to know more about making the work-at-home life rock for you and your family? Check out my latest eBook, How to be a Work-at-Home Mom: The Happily Ever After Guide to Leading the WAHM Life on SALE till 03/11/2012. Get it for just $8.50 instead of the regular price of $17!

? Prerna Malik is a mom, a wife, a writer and woman who believes in parenting with love, being postively productive,?and creating a home that invites you to put your feet up and relax. Find her sharing her simple tips and easy-to-do ideas at?The Mom Writes or follow her on?Twitter.