Comments on: My 8784 hours, day by day https://lauravanderkam.com/2016/05/my-8784-hours-day-by-day/ Writer, Author, Speaker Tue, 17 Apr 2018 14:04:25 +0000 hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.7.2 By: lauravanderkam https://lauravanderkam.com/2016/05/my-8784-hours-day-by-day/#comment-32270 Mon, 06 Jun 2016 10:19:42 +0000 http://lauravanderkam.staging.wpengine.com/?p=6087#comment-32270 In reply to Tonya.

@Tonya- thanks for your note! My housework and errand total includes time spent making meals, cleaning up, any errands such as grocery shopping, clothes shopping, etc. I would say this was a number that was skewed by a few high weeks when I was entertaining. The median was lower. Also, housework is highly fluid. I did a lot more on weeks I was home more. So did it actually have to happen? I don’t know. We have about 8 hours of housekeeping help per week, but my husband would do some of this (and my 10 hours don’t include his) so it doesn’t work to just add the numbers to get a total for taking care of a household. Also, some chunk of the 8 are about making the house cleaner than it would be – not about what has to be done to function.

]]> By: Tonya https://lauravanderkam.com/2016/05/my-8784-hours-day-by-day/#comment-32269 Sat, 04 Jun 2016 00:09:09 +0000 http://lauravanderkam.staging.wpengine.com/?p=6087#comment-32269 I enjoyed the article about your year of tracking that you featured in your newsletter. I’m curious about the roughly 10 hours/week that you spend on housekeeping. What does that include? How many hours per week of household work have you outsourced? Since you make such a conscious effort to minimize and ignore, I figure the sum should give a good idea of the lower bound on how much work is really involved in taking care of a household.

]]> By: lauravanderkam https://lauravanderkam.com/2016/05/my-8784-hours-day-by-day/#comment-32268 Tue, 31 May 2016 12:25:39 +0000 http://lauravanderkam.staging.wpengine.com/?p=6087#comment-32268 In reply to Jana Robertson.

@Jana- thanks for your comment, and welcome! I hope you’ll stick around and read some of the archives. It sounds like you have a very full life, but I do believe there is time. Maybe not a lot at your particular season, but some. And yes, tracking time is great for seeing that. Let me know if you do decide to keep a time log. I would love to see the time log of someone with five kids under the age of 5!

]]> By: Jana Robertson https://lauravanderkam.com/2016/05/my-8784-hours-day-by-day/#comment-32267 Tue, 31 May 2016 02:56:43 +0000 http://lauravanderkam.staging.wpengine.com/?p=6087#comment-32267 I just read your article in the NYT’s – The Busy Person’s Lies loved it. I then stumbled upon your blog. I’m fascinated by your writing…knowing that even I, mother of 5 – 4 years old and under (yes you read that correctly, I have a 4yr, 3yr, 2yr, and 10 month old twins) have more time than I think on any given day. So to answer your question above – I’m not sure I’m an even-every-day sort…it all depends on the twins and their night. And as for work – I work part-time – all hours day and night. Nap time I work. Sometimes when the kids are all up playing – I sneak in and do some work (I’m an artist and have a studio in my house). I feel like I’m all over the place with both sleep and work – but maybe if I documented my time I would see things differently. And that’s something I just might do. (p.s. My husband (and sister-in-law and several friends) went to Princeton class of 2002!

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