Time Management: How do you do it?

[Kimberly Dow]

Ok - this quote is from Chris under a different thread.

Kim,

I am interested that you have multiple projects going on simultaneously! If I tried that, you would only be able to visit me at the institution every other Sunday betyween 2:00 and 2:15. AM.

You might share your processes in the Creativity - Time management thread ,as I think many members would be interested.
__________________
www.ChrisSaper.com


I've answered above, but I have heard so many comments about how fast I am that I'll share my usual schedule. I dont even think I'm that fast - I always feel like I need to paint more. Anyway - on a good day it would be like this -

Up at 6 am - get kids ready and to school - back by 8am
Dishes and other house chores until about 9:30
Nap until about 11:30 (if I've been up late the night before)
Shower, lunch and sometimes exercise until 12:30
In the studio by 12:30 - paint until 3 pm (with internet breaks)
Pick up kids, help with homework, dinner, bed times, etc until 8pm
Sit with husband and watch tv or visit until he goes to bed, maybe 9:30
10pm - paint until my eyes give out...usually between 2-3am

Now - that's an 8-hour painting day, but in truth it's usually a lot more. I skip exercise a lot and can sometimes skip some house stuff and the nap... Realistically that is the schedule above when I am behaving myself. When I am not and really inspired the house gets messy, the kids eat more cereal than usual and the husband comes and sits by me in the studio. If there isnt much homework I can also paint from 4-6pm.

Now - on Jean's advice I am trying to be more healthy. I haven't skipped my exercise now in 3 weeks which is causing me to sleep better - plus I'm doing a bit of packing for our move in a month. (Congratulate us on our new home we bought! Big place with a huge pool!)

The thing about having all these paintings going at once - that's fairly new, but it isn't too bad. One thing that is working well is that I'll have my palette mixed for skin colors to work on one. When I've done all I can and need to let it dry I'll take the palette of paint as its still wet and move onto the next painting with it. Same with a palette for fabrics or backgrounds. This started with getting frustrated with paint drying too fast and trying not to waste it. I actually think it is helping me a bit to be more consistant in my 'style'. I often would paint paintings differently - but as I am working on more at once they seem to be more tied in and look like my work...I think.

Chris - I dont know if this is much help to anyone since I dont think most people could sleep the broken up way I do. Jimmie can though - I know that!

Only one other note I'd make. Im totally serious above where I said 'dont get hair cuts, etc..' I have that curly hair and no one can tell I chop the bangs myself occasionally. I dont get my nails done anymore. I internet shop as much as possible instead of wasting time. I leave home as little as possible. I dont volunteer like I used to at the kids' schools. I combine chores when I have to go shopping or pick up the kids. etc. I also spend my weekends painting...sometimes as many as 40 hours from Friday early to Sunday night (when the husband takes the kids/cooking duties) These aren't sacrifices - it's what I love to do. The only time I can seriously get dragged away from the studio for days is when the family insists on going camping or a family thing.

[Kimberly Dow]

I promise I'm not trying to hijack the thread....it does tie in.
This is one evening - maybe from 8pm - 2am with plenty of breaks looking up at the TV. I was set up in the livingroom that night to watch some program while I painted....
I dont think it was that much accomplished for the hours...
The first one I dont have a 'before' shot - but the background was in. I just did the first lay-in of skin color and hair.
The second one I have posted the before and then just worked on her face and hair that night. Neither are nearly done. These are the two I worked on that night.

Is this fast?

[Jimmie Arroyo]

My turn, my turn.

Wake up about 7am to get my daughter ready for school. At 8:30, I check my mesages and other online stuff. Then either squeeze a few minutes of painting time, cleaning, or take a half hour nap. Shower at 11am, get to work by 12noon.

Stab and make people bleed until 9 or 10pm. Most of the day, wish I was home painting.

Get back home around 9-11pm, eat, read my daughter a story (she stays up until I get home), make my wife watch cartoons. About 12am, I'm ready to paint. Paint til at least 2am if I'm really tired, 4am if I'm not tired or on Fridays and Saturdays.

Sundays are family days, I paint at 12am to 3am. When I'm done painting or drawing, I have a glass of milk.

[Kimberly Dow]

Jimmie - I can't help but wonder if you and I have matching bags under our eyes?

[Michele Rushworth]

Quite a thread! Seems people have been wanting to talk about this for a long time!

My "time management" tips, if you can call them that, are as follows:

First, get a couple of commissions with hard and fast deadlines. There's nothing like an unveiling that HAS to happen on a certain date to make you paint your little behind off, seven days a week, until the piece is done.

Second, "just say no" to almost everything else. About three years ago I decided I could only do two things if I was going to do a decent job of either one: family stuff and artwork. If anything comes up that's outside those two things, I pretty much don't do it. (That includes just saying no to housecleaning too. I hire a cleaning lady whenever I can.)

I try to keep my internet time to the hours before 7 am and after 7pm. I also need frequent breaks during my painting day (typically 9 am to 5 pm) so I pop online for a few short minutes here and there. Otherwise I make a few phone calls or do other paperwork stuff when I take my breaks out of the studio. Before 9 am and after 5 pm I'm Mom again.

I do keep time sheets, of two different types. I track how much time I work each week, and how much of that time is spent on painting, doing marketing, admin stuff or teaching. I average about 40 working hours a week. I also track, separately, how much time I've spent on each painting.

I've never been a night owl but I keep thinking how much more I'd be able to accomplish if I could work til 2 am. Of course, my family would disown me because I'd be a raving lunatic (more so than I am already).

[Patt Legg]

What a thread and a common one indeed.

I have been asking myself this very question and anyone else who would stop to listen.

Julie, I can relate so much with the "flavor" of your post. Particularly with the part about needing balance in your life and the forgetting bill time. I am at a point in my life when I should be very much in control and have plenty of time but I am busier than ever. Not that I didn't intentionally plan it that way but somehow I have allowed it to get out of control.

My 5 adult kids are all on their own now and my time was better, the last one out and ok over 15 years ago. Unfortunately, my hubby has been ill now and home all of the time for over 10 years. He has been able to take over the meals in the evening that has been a blessing and sometimes the laundry (although it is scary sometimes). Also, within the last 1 1/2 years I have opened my own Gallery and Gift Boutique -Tues- Sat. My intention was to paint on location within my shoppe. Well my left brain has plenty of battles with my right side of the brain -finding it very difficult to concentrate on serious work (commissions)

I proceeded to only paint still life, whatever I could to demo for my incoming customers. Now I have my easel (the Sorg here on the sideline) set up in part of my dining room at home with my serious portrait setting there. Now here is where I thought putting Michele's theory to work was for me. I have 5 commissioned portraits with their deadlines (sort of) . What I have found is that most of my clients will say "whenever" I finish is ok with them. So what do I do-----procrastinate.

Meanwhile I am working on my web pages myself, yes Kimberly I cut my hair myself for over 2 years now, manage my 4 rentals we have had for 10 years as extra income, clean our 10 room 2-story house (sometimes), go to some outside interests for the interest of my in-town business, on occasion sit with or play with one of our 12 grandchildren, do a yard sale, meanwhile my hubby is admitted to the hospital usually 3 times a year for 3-15 days, yadda yadda yadda.

I had better stop now as I feel I am hogging space. I am totally out of control of my life - painting life at least-feeling so distressed that I cannot paint and at the moment, I am flat on my back most of the past 3 days due to stress and problems in my back that I cannot walk.

Help!!!! I do actually accomplish most of all that I set out to do , believe it or not, but my body, my health and my painting is suffering.

I feel sometimes like I am racing against time but not sure why.



I will stop

[Patt Legg]

Oh and I almost forgot, ( I said my memory is failing too) I also do 3 to 5 six day workshops a year in beginner oil painting.

Any suggestions as to how to actually orgainize my time -beginning with organizing my thoughts?

Thanks
Patt

[Julie Deane]

Here's what I have been doing this school year - getting too little sleep, leaving the dishes for the morning because I am too busy with projects at night, not putting away the clean clothes so that they are on every open space in my room while the dirties go to the floor, never getting around to washing the car, paying a neighborhood child to walk the dog these last ultra-busy weeks of school, buying fresh foods meaning to cook them but not getting around to it so throwing them out, eating too much fast food, getting charges once on a credit card because I lost track of the bill in my mess and paid it late.

Here's what I plan to do - work only 4 days a week next year, with an agreed cap on how many kids I see per week (I'm a speech-language pathologist in a public school system). Before this I had to take however many were thrown at me, and it was always horrendous numbers. It means a 20% pay cut at the same time that certain bills, like insurance, are going up, so I am dealing with fear, but feel it is necessary for sanity. Plan to supplement income if possible by renting out a master bedroom that I am transforming into an efficiency apartment. Maybe do some supplementary contract speech therapy if things get too rough financially. Watch my expenditures more carefully. Certainly hope to sell more portraits, and hope that the gallery owner who took me on this year can sell some commissions like she did for other portrait artists in the past.

I need some balance in my life, including taking the time to exercise and eat right. Adding art to an already stressful life messed me up physically to some degree, too. So - enough already - I am wanting to paint, but not to the degree that I kill myself. With another day free, I hope to use that time wisely, which will include painting/drawing time.