Tips for Working Successfully from Home

How are you dealing with the forced hibernation of COVID-19? It might be better were there actually time to sleep! Instead many of us find ourselves juggling several balls. Working from home, taking care of kids, homeschooling, making meals, getting exercise, staying sane. It makes being in the office seem like a tropical retreat!

Today, your similarly trapped friends from Elmhurst® 1925 have some tips to help you endure…and perhaps even thrive in this unexpected season. Dorothy was right, there IS no place like home.

Take Breaks

At work, few of us are chained to our desk; and if you literally are, it’s time to float some resumes. Get up. Grab your coffee in the kitchen (as a not-too-shameless plug, Elmhurst has oat and creamers, barista products, and lattes for this). Step out to the patio for some air (in a wired world, you might even bring your “office” outside). Have your water cooler conversation with your family. Take a minute to engage with silly memes on social. You’re human! As humans, we’re more productive when we acknowledge our limits and take a minute to be.

Keeping the Kids Busy: Youth-Minded Crafts, Projects, Puzzles & More

If you have young children, dropping them in front of the TV probably isn’t your all-day preference. Especially when Barney or the talking sponge come on. If you want to put kids into a self-directed pattern of creativity, try a craft project. This way you can do your work with only the odd interruption to say, “Good job, honey,” to the popsicle stick thing or help with the scissors, glue, or best of all glitter. There are some cool things you can do with your empty Elmhurst carton. This page will have your children making dump trucks, windsocks, birdhouses, and pantry organizing containers (we like this one, it’s a win-win) in no time.

Of course, we all know those projects from the science fairs – the ones where parents wind-up doing most of the work. If you don’t have time for that, there is an alternative.

Bring Your Children to Work…Without Leaving Home!

The schools say it isn’t summer vacation. OK…sure. But give them a break: If you’re losing months of school year, some of the learning must come home. Fortunately, you have a pretty good school set up already: your job!

My daughter has been visiting me at my computer this week. I suppose I have a new boss, but she is an encouraging modern sort. I was writing an article about dams the other day. She thought it was a story and insisted I read it aloud. I warned her that it wasn’t terribly interesting. When I finished (using it as a proofreading opportunity), she told me, “Wow, dad, that was amazing! You wrote all that?” I proceeded to relate the idea of dams to Frozen II. So, I worked, my daughter learned, and everyone won.

If you’re working from home, share it with your kids! More likely than not, they yearn to know what goes on those eight or ten hours you’re gone each day. We’re not saying to assign them that important report due 9am tomorrow. But if you’re a writer, read to them. If you work with numbers, challenge them with a bit of arithmetic. If you have an idea, run it by them. (Kids are mini marketing geniuses in a way the adult mind cannot replicate.)

Make Quick and Easy Meals with These Recipe Ideas

Working from home is challenging; probably more wearing than being in the office. Unless you’re one of those forever-smiling influencer moms with bottomless energy and ambition, you may find yourself a wee bit tired. That isn’t the ideal condition for a gourmet meal, especially with hungry kids tugging at you all day. When the appeasement of single-serve oat milk ends, and it’s time for the family to reconvene, you have a few options.

The slow cooker is everyone’s friend, of course. Then there’s always the legend of the quick-and-easy meal. Unlike Paul Bunyan and Babe the Blue Ox, it happens to be true. Rachael Ray made a career of it. We suggest the evergreen (or ever-white) pleasure of vegan garlic mashed potatoes, for one. (You know it is busy person-friendly when the recipe reads “large pot” and “electric mixer” …whiiiizzzz.) There is much more on our site, and don’t fear not having the right Elmhurst product; most of these recipes welcome substitutions!

If you want to make quick meals without compromising healthy habits, we have some advice about vegetable oils, fortification and enrichment, and added gums and thickeners.

Explore Coffee and Tea with Healthy Caffeine Drinks

Coffee fights through exhaustion, tea brings repose to stressful situations. These are known facts – or at least very strong opinions which few would dispute. What’s nice is that both functions are ideal for working from home. Kids squabbling over the merits of Transformers versus Princesses? Try some tea. Pulling to consciousness in the morning, or fighting to resist the allure of the couch? Try some coffee. Of course, the arts of steaming and foaming might be challenged by the 10am conference call. The 11am outburst (get them going on those carton spice containers, we’re telling you). The 12pm lunch demands. The 1pm emergency project. In this case, you can pour some healthy hemp coffee creamer into your instant and make something of it. Or…Elmhurst lattes come naturally caffeinated in both coffee (flash brew, cacao) and tea (golden milk, matcha), you know.

How to Relax at Home: Take Care of Yourself, Take Care of Others

This is not an easy time for anyone, and we both know: Working from home is not vacation. Indeed, it can be even harder than the office, especially with kids! We think these tips will help you to keep all those balls in the air. You’re important. Elmhurst will be here to send product when you need it. Meanwhile, don’t forget to check on your loved ones. We will come out of this, back into the world – perhaps even with generous memories of time spent together.