Wednesday 2 November 2011

Multi tasking

I have a lovely life. It's ace. It's a bit too full and a bit too busy and I struggle desperately for enough hours in each day but it's lovely.
Teaching Number One Son from home has been an amazing adventure so far. To a certain degree he's autodidactic (isn't that a wonderful word?) where I help set him up with resources and he cracks on alone. For other things, I'm there working one on one with him. It's built an even better relationship between us (with occasional humdingers when we clash) and has taught me at least as much as he is learning. He's also good company and I'll miss him dreadfully when he rejoins mainstream education in a year or so.

However, I do rather miss a bit of free time to manage my own tasks, work and (dare I hope for one?) social life. Home education, running a business, looking after my other two kids and their needs and all the normal household stuff is a bit much some times.

Work is very busy as well. I'm supplying three outlets, all with very different markets which means I ride out the seasonal ups and downs pretty well. I've changed what I do quite a bit: the cake box club is taking a break because I don't have the time just now for all the experimenting. I also didn't do my usual load of Hallowe'en baking for parties and so on; there just wasn't the time.

However, I have branched out in a new direction. I start running an after school baking club at the kids' primary school next week. I'll let you know how that goes. I don't really have the time for it (obviously) but I thought it would be good fun and it does me good to get out of my own kitchen for a little while, even if it's only to go to someone else's!
I did my first ever baking birthday party last month (and supplied the Narnia wardrobe cake above to the birthday girl), and I'm planning workshop days for both kids and adults in the next few months. I've had quite a lot of interest. The main difficulties I have are setting prices - something I always struggle with as I hate charging people money - and sorting out the tedious stuff like insurance and so on. Then there's the Not As Easy As You'd Think matter of finding a weekend when I'm not already committed to doing things.

The last part of my task-juggling life right now is getting ready for Christmas. If last year is anything to go by, i need to make over 40 small Christmas cakes, 10 jars of mincemeat and spend the last week of November marzipanning day and night. I'm also doing some Christmas cakes with gluten free flour this year, which may take a little bit of experimenting.

So, as I said, I have a lovely life. A busy, untidy, chaotic, frequently noisy and usually delicious-smelling lovely life. I have great kids, run a business I love and only really need an extra few hours in a day to get everything sorted. Oh, and for the laundry fairies, washing up fairies and ideally accountancy clerk fairies to come and help out a bit. And a coffee.