Five Tips On Finding Time To Blog As A New Parent

When you’re a new parent you find you don’t have much time to do anything other than look after your new baby. Feeding, cuddling, holding them while they sleep (this takes a while!), changing them, buying things, doing the washing, all the while looking after everything else like your home, perhaps going to work…maybe caring for other children. It’s an incredibly important and busy time.

Of course, when you’ve just had a baby the absolute number one priority is your baby and your family. For the vast majority of people they won’t even think of writing or starting a blog. However, there are some strange people like me who think it’s a great time to start! Crazy! I just felt there was something beautiful about starting a diary at the time my son was born, a diary just for him (see here).

I am asked sometimes how I find the time to blog having just had a baby and working full time. It’s a good question as I get up at 6am and don’t stop to sit down for any prolonged period until about 7:30pm. At that time of course I want to relax and spend time with my wife (and have tea!). Yet I tend to write around three blog posts per week…but how do I find the time to do that?

My Fantastic Five Tips

So, looking back since I started my blog I’ve learned a lot, including the best ways for me to find time to write posts. My tips would be:

1. Preparation is key – I started preparing my blog and setting everything up a couple of months before I actually launched the site, i.e. before our baby was born. This got me in the habit, made sure I knew the blogging tools well and helped me develop my writing style. It takes time to do all these things, and how much time depends on you, dear reader, on how much time you want or are able to spend preparing ahead of the birth. The more time you invest the better. For example, I’ve still got two or three blog posts I’m sitting on from before I launched my blog just waiting for the right moment to release them. I’m also thinking months ahead of what posts I’d like to ideally release and when. Prepare prepare prepare
2. Use all tools at your disposal – I use WordPress to help me manage my blog and

   

   associated content. WordPress has an app available for you to produce blogs which means you can write when you have five minutes anywhere you have a signal. In fact, I’m sitting here watching the TV whilst writing this blog on the app on my phone. It’s a very good app. This is just one example of using the tools at your disposal. I also use my phone to take photos, and the way I have it set up with my Mac the photos automatically transfer across so I don’t have to plug my phone in and transfer photos myself when I want to work on the app. Every little bit of time saved helps

3. Take every few minutes you can to write rather than one long stretch – standing in a queue waiting to pay for your shopping? Blog. On a car journey (and not driving!)? Blog. Waiting for your potato to cook in the microwave? Blog. The key thing for me is that you don’t have to find an hour all in one go that you can set aside to blog, just do it when you find a few spare minutes. Any time can be useful, even a couple of minutes. You can ‘polish’ your post on a laptop, but most of the effort is in writing it, which can be done anywhere at any time. In fact I’m in this exact position now with three posts written on my phone that just need ‘polishing’ on the laptop
4. Plan your post before you write – this one is very important to me. Finding the time to sit

   

   and write can be difficult. It’s even more difficult finding the time to think of a post, plan it out, think of your key messages and structure, and then actually write it. You can do most of this thinking well ahead of time. I’m often thinking about post three, four or five in the future rather than the one I’m writing now. Perhaps this is just titles of posts, maybe there is thought around the content, maybe even the different sections, or for the super organised even the photos to include (this one is rarely me, but something I should do!). Get into the habit of being consciously aware of what’s happening around you and be almost always ‘on’…inspiration for a post can hit you at any time

5. Take lots of photos – struggling to think how this one can fit in with finding time to post? Well, let’s assume for a moment that your posts include some photos. I’ve read blogs with and without photos, and the ones that grab me more have photos. Sometimes very personal, or sometimes just to emphasise a point, but they stand out and engage an audience. As such, I like photos (or at a minimum simple pictures) in my posts. Therefore you can start to take some great photos with the massive, huge and complex equipment called a mobile phone! I don’t use anything else now as they are so advanced and such good quality with excellent editing capabilities. Just use your phone when you are out and about. Perhaps a stop sign, a tree, a football net. Whatever random stuff you see that takes your fancy, pic it. You never know when they will come in handy. These can even go in a ‘blog’ folder for easy access. This will mean you have quick and easy access to loads of your own photos rather than searching for them. This is another great way to save some time

Now Get Going!

There you have it. My top tips on how to find the time to blog even when you have a newborn. This can apply to many situations in fairness, having older children, a busy work, lots of other things going on. All of these tips can help anyone at any time. Try them out!