When Tricia Fockler Beaty is not driving one of her five kids to piano, flute or cello lessons - or shopping, cooking, cleaning or attending parent teacher interviews - she has time for her other job.
Beaty, 46, is a medical doctor. She works three to four days a week as a general practitioner in a Vancouver clinic. To stay sane and also to keep her household running smoothly, she has developed a routine, she says. But first and most critical is her attitude: "I try not to take on too much," is her mantra. For instance, Beaty attends parent-teacher meetings and knows what's happening in her children's schools, but she volunteers only once or twice a year. Setting limits is a necessary skill that ensures she can manage the tasks she's already taken on.
A critical tool for communicating with her husband, Ross, a geologist and businessman who travels frequently, is the household calendar. Kept beside the telephone, it's the "backup" when the couple can't talk face-to-face.
Although the family would seem like ideal candidates for big-box stores like Costco, Beaty says that you need to consider the time it takes to drive to those stores, and the hours spent patrolling their giant aisles. She finds it's more efficient to shop at her local supermarket where she knows where products are, and she can get in and out quickly - because time is in short supply for doing laundry, if nothing else.
"Laundry is a big issue in our family because there's a lot of it. I just get up and do it in the morning, when I'm fresh. I walk into the kids' rooms and drag the dirty laundry out," Beaty says. In really organized homes, she muses, the kids do their own laundry - a nirvana she can only dream about. Cleaning is reserved for her days off. Though Beaty doesn't hire cleaning help regularly, she does call someone in when the "little details" she ignores start to bug her. Otherwise, she makes a mental trade-off: time spent with her kids is more important than dusting.
Any mom who does a lot of driving knows that's the time for one-on-one conversations with children, Beaty says. The key to getting all her kids where they need to go is planning. When she signs them up for courses or activities each fall, Beaty seriously considers how much she can realistically take on in a day. Even with limits, Beaty ends up improvising a lot - another key to success for her family. But despite all she packs into her days, Beaty says she doesn't feel very organized.
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