Balancing work and play

Today has been a mediocre day, actually this whole weekend has been pretty mediocre. One problem that faces any parent that has a lot of stress in life, e.g. college and work, needs to find the time to balance interacting with their children and personal recreation time. I am sure many of you agree, this is very hard to manage. For example, I have been going to college and working at college for the past year, 8:00 - 5:00ish everyday during the week. This leaves Friday evening, Saturday, and Sunday to accomplish the above mentioned tasks. For the most part, we have not been doing anything personally for us, not in the least part due to the lack of funds. This weekend we tried to do something for us one day, something for our daughter another day, and have a "lazy day" on memorial day. This did not work out so well. It has been so long since we tried to go out and do something that we could not decide on what to do. On Saturday, we just kind of went in circles and stayed around the house. Today was a bit better. We actually got to the pool, went around shopping a bit, went out to eat, and even managed to clean up the house!

Perhaps the next weekend will be a bit more decisive. When the stress levels get high, I think a lot of people forget that this rubs off on their kids too. I for one am in an absolute need to get out more at this point in my life. I think it would calm me more during the week, leading to more productivity, including better parenting!