Balancing life activities

[Ana]

I don't ride recreationally as much as I'd like, although I do commute a short 2.4 miles roundtrip each day. I do not consider my commute a substantial enough ride to qualify as "real exercise" even though it helps keep my waist trim

I like to do so many things, including cycling, cooking, baking, socializing, reading, etc. (not to mention household responsibilities like cleaning, laundry, dishes, etc). Honestly, by the time I get home from work I'm usually so tired that I cook a meal, do one or two household chores, read and head to bed. I wish I felt like going on a ride but I don't really feel like battling the rush hour traffic, plus the days are getting shorter.

I do try to ride primarily on weekends but I also find that my riding time competes with errands and other commitments I have.

How do you balance it all? I know prioritization is involved but I don't want to sacrifice home-cooked meals from scratch or leisurely bike rides.

[shootingstar]

Is it at all possible to add on some extra miles 2-3 times per wk. for each of your commuting rides?

Ever since I returned to cycling, I hardly do any sewing and only bake 1-2 types of desserts, um...about once a month or less.

I no longer am interested in much fashion shopping or alot of window shopping. I catch up on such activity every 3-4 months by wandering 1-2 hrs. in stores. Very different from fashionistas. Hence my fashion sense, is delayed...seriously.

Over the years, my body now desires to begin cycling early in the morning....a good thing..since I can do lots and have the rest of the day for other stuff.

Of course, things get more complicated when one has children which I don't have.

[Reesha]

I generally go through phases with most of my other hobbies besides cycling and cooking. Cycling is my constant and well... a girl's got to eat!

For instance... I only knit when it's starting to cool off. I camp when it's beautiful outside and I've got company. I hike if I'm in the mountains (it used to be all the time, now it's isolated). Sometimes I'll devour six books in a row and not pick another one up for months.

It all somehow works out. I stopped sweating it. I think I realized that I have too many hobbies to every really devote myself to cycling or triathlon at a high level, but it's still entirely enjoyable.

[ny biker]

I have no life...

[Grog]

I have a 25-30 km roundtrip commute with lots of hills, so the basics are a bit different. I don't do a whole lot of recreational riding anymore, but my husband rides A LOT. But, seriously, we don't clean very much in this house. I mean, it's hygienic, but often messy. Laundry gets done on the fly. We do not skimp on cooking though. But keeping the house in acceptable condition (as opposed to really nice) does save us a lot of time. Also, living in an apartment (so less maintenance & housekeeping overall) helps.

Also, we don't socialize a whole lot, and baking is (unfortunately) not done every week.

[BalaRoja]

The $64k question - you asked it

It truly says something about our contemporary/modern lives when 24 hours in a day somehow seems like hardly enough!

Getting out of metaphysics and into a more practical approach - I try to be super efficient with my rides. That might mean using the indoor trainer more so I can avoid spending 30+ minutes just getting to the places I like to ride. Not to mention less costuming/prep/etc.

Another thing is prepping meals ahead of time. I might make some extra staples - like rice, pasta, beans, etc - and combine it with an easy to make side dish, such as a chicken roast. I can put in the roast and know that in roughly 75 minutes or so, it'll be done and with the other stuff already prepped, dinner is ready.

Sometimes I'll even put the chicken in between intervals on the trainer!

[lph]

We both work reduced hours (80%). Started when our son was born at the same time that we were just getting into the job market, kept it that way because it's a good way to live. All our choices since then are geared to a lower than 2x100 % income. We have a small apartment, tiny garden, in a low status part of town.

All 3 of us have a 2 week rotating schedule for all the regular household chores (except food shopping and making dinner, only us adults do that one) so that no-one ends up shouldering too much.

We have a cleaning service that comes in every two weeks. The house HAS to be tidy by then, otherwise it pretty much slides.

We postpone re-decorating and everyday maintenance a LOT. We still have large unpainted spots, loose sidings and open electrical sockets from when we moved in... um... two years ago?

And we don't enjoy cooking that much. We make a home-cooked dinner every day mostly from scratch, but it's usually the same ten 30-minute recipes or so over and over, nothing that involves thinking. We only bake or make desserts for special occasions like birthdays or friends visiting, which doesn't happen very often. Our son wishes we had dessert more often, but now he has a smoothie maker and can mess around with that instead We usually socialize during activities rather than at home.

I try to fit in as much "me-time" as I can around my commute, take a longer route, add a kayaking trip. I feel most energetic when I'm already out moving, and going out again later is too much hard work. I'm really lucky to live where this is possible, but it also takes a bit of creativity.

I'm not getting a fabulous career this way, but hey, I'm having fun

[shootingstar]

We've never had takeout since I've been with dearie. Where we have lived since we've known each other, has been always close to restaurants, cafes. So it made more sense for us to eat out in the restaurant itself and often pay same price as takeout food, but have the restaurant staff do serving and clean up dishes instead.

For cost-savings reasons we only eat out once a week for dinner in our home town at places for $10-15 per person.

Our home isn't super clean, just organized to keep us happy, efficient and clean. We do a massive clean job only occasionally, I admit. We do laundry about every 2-3 wks. Unlike some people, I wear a shirt or pants several times before throwing it in wash.

Earlier in this post, I commented how rarely I do fashion shopping. Well it's just grocery shopping and going to drugstore for toilerties that I appreciate.

[indigoiis]

My DH is very old fashioned / homebody about food. I suppose it is because he was a bachelor for most of his adult life. We grocery shop together (with a list) on the weekend, alternating weeks to pay. We try to buy all the food for dinners for the week. We'll cook something like a chicken early in the week when my (vegetarian) daugher is at her Dad's - that will last three nights in different forms. Or he'll make a killer meatloaf which goes two nights. On vegetarian nights my daughter will cook or I will make a quick stir-fry. But it sure does save time to have everything on hand.
We sit down to dinner as well and try to eat before or at 7:30 because we all go to bed at nine!

I'll make my lunch from leftovers and get my bike bag or other gear ready
before bed.

Routines are key. And if you have kids, delegate stuff for them to do! My kid hates the barn chores so I make her do the dogs and run a load of dishes (we have no dishwasher) when she's at our house.

Here's the big thing:
Don't stress if you can't do it all. Schedules are just suggestions. Sometimes an impromptu trip to the ice cream shack is in order. Or a late night walk without lights with the dogs. Or sitting with your kid while she goes through a hormonal mini breakdown. All more important than getting in that 5 mile run!

[GulfCoastAmy]

Can you cycle early in the morning before work, or extend your commute? Truthfully, my nights sound an awful lot like yours, but at least I have already gotten my ride in for the day.

[Crankin]

Indi, your attitude sounds like my house! My DH and I go grocery shopping together a lot of the time and we laugh that we are the "old people" in the store.
I notice that a lot of people eat the same meal a couple of nights in a row. I couldn't do that! Although I do bring leftovers for lunch at times.
And sometimes, as we say, we decide to "be regular people" and sit on the deck and drink wine instead of going for a ride.

[tulip]

Funny, I was in a workshop today (to get required continuing education credits for a professional credential) and I ended up working up several "schedule scenarios" to try to fit in all that I want and need to do. No, that was not part of the workshop agenda!

I don't want to come up with some schedule that I can't keep and then feel like a failure for not being able to stick to it. So I'm trying to be realistic in balancing it all. There's work, can't let that drop because I need to eat and pay my bills. Then there's cycling, and I'm trying to do MORE of that and not less...there's my house projects, which I only do on the weekends, and then there's my garden, which is my salvation and my peace, so I'm not going to give that up. Oh, and I do have to take my dog out for two long walks per day or he goes apesh-t. And since he's a border collie, I also should teach him a new trick every week and work on it for 15 minutes per day to keep his mind occupied...how about the trick of making me dinner? But I wouldn't give him up.

There's the cleaning and the cooking and the shopping. I love to cook, and you gotta shop if you're going to cook. I don't particularly like cleaning but I do like having a clean and neat house. A house cleaner is not currently in the budget, so I have to do it myself.

Then there are the things that I want to do: play my music, knit, keep up with my French, learn Spanish, and a few other interests.

My solution is to do what's important every day (work, eat well, exercise, walk the dog) and the rest I fit in during the week. Yes, it would be best for my music if I practiced every day, but it ain't happening and I'm not a pro so that's okay. Same for the languages. Sometimes my house is messy. Sometimes my laundry doesn't get folded.

I've come to realize that I don't have to be perfect at everything. It only took 42 years!

[tc1]

Lessee, 2 adults, both work full time, 1 german shorthaired pointer. Like Tulip's dog, our dog needs two walks a day.

First off, housework is last priority. Thankfully mom refused to instill in us girls that our worth was tied to how well we kept house, so I don't feel bad when it gets cruddy. It gets clean eventually. Interestingly enough the boyfriend had more trouble with the messy house, but he never tried the it's woman's work crap with me. We have never hired someone to come in; we would love to but never found anyone we could trust to handle a big dog and not let the dog out to get run over. The yard work is hired out, and they do a crummy job but I live with it.

Meals have always been a sore point with us. I cook from scratch, he won't unless forced, which is funny because he is actually a great cook. So we eat way more takeout than we should, which leads to other problems. Sometimes on the weekend I will make something to last a few days, then have it during the week, but I also can't stand to eat the same thing 2 meals, or even 2 days, in a row.

So I guess my priority is first the dog, because he is relatively powerless and our responsibility. BF walks him in the morning, I do in the afternoon. Then household stuff that has to be done, like paying bills or emptying the trash. Then getting up and going to work 40 hours/week, because that makes all the rest of life possible.

Whatever time is left I read, ride the bike, watch too much news online and on TV and in the paper (always a struggle to keep my news addiction under control) attempt to learn the guitar, ski, walk another dog 3X weekly for volunteer work, and my latest, learn how to track with the pointer. I have pretty much given up gardening, though I may get back into it. Ya just can't do it all at once.