If you are a fire wife then you probably know how difficult it is to work with their schedule. Especially if you have kids. One thing that makes it even more difficult for me is vacations.
Before getting hired on full-time we didn’t go on vacations. When you work construction if you don’t work, you don’t get paid. There was no vacation pay or time. So taking the loss of pay and also paying for vacation was out of the picture with little one’s to feed and clothe.
Now not only do we finally get the vacation time he so deserves and worked so hard for, but we have those 4 days off between sets to run off on little mini-vacations. Needless to say there have been a lot of mini-vacations. How’s a girl supposed to work around a chaotic schedule that we may run off at the drop of a hat? I can’t! lol Thankfully I work for myself so I’m able to rearrange things as needed.
For example, we are in McCall, Idaho right now and the plan was to leave early Sunday. We’d be sure to miss the super-bowl because it’s at least an 8 hour drive back home. I was bummed because I can’t ever remember missing a game, but it’s been a blast so I can suck it up. Well over a few beers it was decided that the guys could all rearrange their schedules so we could stay another day. lol Gotta love the fact that there are always guys at the department that will do shift trades.
So that just leaves me and the millions of calls I’ll have to make tomorrow for canceling my seniors fitness class. I feel like a little kid, I don’t wanna make the calls. Quite a few of them will be really disappointed because I already canceled class on Friday. But oh well, these are such great memories with the kids. We went skiing at Brundage and it was AMAZING! So much powder.
If I held a 9-5 I’d have been fired many times in the last 3 years. So while hubby bitches about paying my bills, how can it be any other way and have me be ready to runaway on mini-vacations whenever we want?
Twitter: FireMom
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Yes. A typical 9-5 wouldn’t work with our fire schedule either. I’m lucky that I have my freelancing career and my new part-time photography job. The latter isn’t necessary for financial reason but simply because the door opened and I walked through it. I’m one of very few fire wives in our department who works at all outside the home though. It’s just very difficult with the schedule.
Absolutely! His schedule was one of the reasons I left my full time job just before my son was born. We didn’t want to pay for full-time care, but there are no daycare centers that would do rotating days. But I love what I do now, and even with my PT job I only work when he is on days off. I know so many families paying for full time childcare when they really only need 2 days a week – just different days each week! I also love that I can run errands during the week because he is home and I don’t have to take all the kids out to pick up a gallon of milk or something. This summer we’ve decided to skip summer camps and just do family things, and his weekdays off will make for some great mini-vacations!
I’ve been lucky and never used daycare because of family and neighbors. But what a nightmare that would be to workaround. Yeah, you’d have to hold your full-time spot because of the different days. YIKES! Definitely would need to be pulling in a good income and doing something you really loved to make it worth that.
I just married my firefighter less than a year ago. Together we have four kiddos; 15, 13, 7, & 6. The teenagers are with us full time and the lil’ ones have different schedules between our and their other homes (both within a few miles). It does get a bit confusing at times, so we keep a whiteboard calendar in the common area.
God Blessed me with a new job just before we started dating (after being friends for 13 years). I must put in my 8 daily hours anytime between 7AM and 6PM M-F, am blessed to work from home 4 out of 5 days, AND get to choose which day I go to work:) I usually go in during his first off-day.
The hard part is while he is off, I am working, the kiddos are at school, and we are both home. He wants to go play (or stay and play;)) and I just can’t. It’s hard enough to remain motivated and not procrastinate or get off track while working from home. But, sometime’s he’s soooo cute and irresistable that I just cannot focus on work.
For a while, I was really challeged with balancing hubby time with work time. I have found little ways to reduce the stress this balancing act induces:
1) Know when my co-workers need me to get busy and when I can slack a bit.
2) Work Very Hard when they need me (above-and-beyond hard) so I can take advantage of every slack opportunity.
3) Take Advantange of Every Slack Opportunity, i.e. Play With Hubby Time!
4) (Most Important) Give myself some slack and credit for trying when I don’t do so well with steps 1, 2, and 3.
Thanks so much for commenting MrsBehave. So true on your tips. I worked my butt off the beginning of the week thankfully, because Friday ended up with a long bike ride in the sunshine and I can’t even remember some of the other days. lol This week I think I’m taking my laptop and running away for a few hours a day to really get stuff done.
Glad you have a job that works around the craziness!
My only saving grace is that I work with a ROWE schedule. Results Only Work Environment. I can work any where I want, and at any time I want – as long as I meet my goals. Before that, I had to have live in help!
The down side is that I sometimes work until 1am or later because I had to handle little league games, dance class, scouting and everything else during the daylight hours and have to “catch up”!
Exactly Cyndi. Like this weekend when I needed to get a minor project done. There was no way, so now I’ll be busting my butt long hours today (monday) to get it done and the regular things I had on the list for work. Oh well, taking the kids skiing and to meet Seth Wescott (2 time olympic gold medalist) was worth it.