F.O.C.U.S.

By learning to focus better, you'll find that you get so much more done that you thought was impossible.

My wife goes to nursing school full time right now, and I have 4 at home that I home-school, 1 boy 6 years old, 3 girls at 7, 8, and 9 years old. We also have a 10 year old daughter in a private school.

In order to get any work done, I block our time in 30 minute to hour increments, for example, one hour helping them with math, one hour reading, one hour free time for them while i work on article writing, 30 minutes to do a blog posting, 1 hour for research, 30 minutes for a family workout, etc.

It sounds complicated, but really isn't once you commit to it.

The main problem I had when I started working full time online was FOCUS, and I still sometimes waste time surfing instead of working, or reading about all the great new Internet Products I could buy when I should spend time writing content instead.

Once we started homeschooling last year, I had to really get dedicated to maintaing a proper focus and still work daily at trying to keep the right mindset to balance family and work obligations without feeling like I have neglected either.

I developed an acronym that helps me out, hopefully it can help others:

F - Find a place to work with minimal distractions
O - Organize (my desk was a mess, but now I can find stuff quickly)
C - Concentrate on only one project at a time
U - Use tools you have (Go through those folders of PDF's and software)
S - Set a goal and stay on target to reach it.

Chinese New Year

Happy Chinese New Year in this, the Year of the Dog. Today we went to The Trammell & Margaret Crow Collection of Asian Art in downtown Dallas to celebrate. They had kite making, instrument making, karate exhibitions, and Chinese dancers. And at the end of the day they had a Chinese Dragon, which was pretty cool for the kids.

After all of that, we then went and had Chinese food, so I think we pretty much covered all our bases today. Dori is currently studying China at Hockaday, so hopefully the visit helped her out a little, and we also swung by the Dallas Museum of Art to get some pictures of Marie with some art to enable her to finish some of the homework she has from her Art Appreciation class. Tomorrow we'll have the kids do a journal on their experiences this weekend.