Choose an endpoint to your day and stick to it.
Just as work outside the home has a quitting time, our work inside our home—our homemaking and parenting— needs to have a daily quitting time. In one sense, our work of parenting and homemaking never ends. However, I suggest to you that you draw an imaginary boundary to your day. Maybe it’s after supper and the dishes are done. Close your kitchen. Turn off the kitchen lights. Purpose to not do any more housework that day. Just bathe the kids and put them to bed….but no more work.
Give yourself some margin to enjoy your children and husband in the time between dinner and bath/bedtime. Be present. Not on your phone. Not doing laundry. Not paying bills.
Now you may be asking, “When am I going to do the laundry/pay the bills/make lunches for tomorrow/clean my bathrooms/etc., if I stop my work each night before bed. I need to work right up until the time my head hits my pillow!” You will have to 1) be creative and 2) let some things go until the next day or the weekend if you are working outside the home.
Do what you can before supper and during the supper clean up, and then just be done. I think you will all benefit from some down time (to watch a show, read, do a craft, talk to your husband, etc.) at the end of your day.
