I recently found a secret weapon against all that working mom’s guilt and errand chaos: TaskRabbit. If you haven’t heard about it, TaskRabbit gives everyday people access to on-demand errand runners for things like grocery shopping, dry cleaning pickup, mailing postal packages, assembling IKEA furniture, handyman tasks and yes, even meal preparation and pet care.

I’ve used TaskRabbit on three separate occasions, and have been blessed with super helpful ‘errand angels’ as I like to call them! One TaskRabbit brought me chicken soup while I was down with a bad flu and my husband was out of town. Another TaskRabbit unpacked what remained of our moving boxes and organized my closet top to bottom, moving one season into storage boxes and a new season of freshly pressed clothes in its place. I found out she was a big cat lover during her first assignment at our house, so I hired her for a repeat assignment to house sit our three cats while we were away for an extended family holiday. 

TaskRabbit was founded by Leah Busque in 2008, an engineer-turned-entrepreneur who was inspired to create the company one cold Boston night. Leah wished she could hire an errand runner to fetch her Labrador Retriever a bag of much-needed dog food so she could instead make dinner with her husband. TaskRabbit recently raised an impressive $17.8 million in venture funding to expand its workforce of ‘rabbits’ to multiple cities nationwide. That’s good news for working parents who need extra help from willing and helpful people, and also for the local economies that TaskRabbit touches. There are a multitude of underemployed people and workers seeking flexible employment (such as part-time and stay-at-home parents) around the country, who may be just one or two errands away from being fully employed. Go TaskRabbit, go! I’m rooting for you and for the odd jobs you’re bringing to Americans everywhere.

Please note that I am in no way paid to endorse TaskRabbit, or have any official commercial relationship with the company or its affiliates. I am merely a big fan, since the service helps me get more things done and focus on the things I love to do vs. the things I need to do to run my home life while working and juggling kids.

Every mom I know has done this ‘working mom’s’ cost calculation in her head, usually way before she has to decide whether to be a stay-at-home mom or some form of part-time or full-time working mom. It’s heartbreaking that so many women feel forced to give up their careers and the work they are passionate about because of economics, but you do the math and tell me how it can be different.

Let’s use a real example from here in the San Francisco Bay Area, since childcare costs are incredibly high here and the problem is even more exacerbated than in other parts of the country:
- Meet Cindy, an elementary school teacher making $54,000 a year in after-tax income.
- Cindy is having a baby and calculates that replacing herself as primary caregiver will cost her $15/hour for a qualified nanny to care for her daughter in her own home.
- Cindy does not want to put her daughter in daycare, and she has no room in her home to hire an au pair, so a part-time nanny is her only option.
- Cindy estimates she needs 45 hours of care per week, given her teacher’s schedule.
- Cindy calculates 45 hrs x $15/hr = $675/week to pay someone else to take care of her daughter.
- Cindy pays her nanny $35,100 per year in after-tax income.
- Imagine Cindy’s heartbreaking realization that, despite having a decent teacher’s salary of $54k/year, her after-tax income is only $40K, of which $35K goes to her nanny
- In Cindy’s mind, she is working full-time so she can earn a mere $5k more than her own nanny, who has the added benefit of spending time with Cindy’s daughter, while Cindy is hard at work and away from her

Question: If you were Cindy, what would YOU do? Would you continue to work at your very tough teacher’s job, earning a very modest teacher’s income, given the childcare costs in your area? Would you ‘compromise’ on childcare quality for a ‘cheaper’ nanny, or send your child to daycare even if you don’t want to? Or would you do what many of my teacher friends have done, which is opt-out of working entirely and stay home with your child, because in the end, the economics don’t make sense?

Here’s another example:
- Jane is a mid-level executive making $140K per year at her technology job.
- Jane has one child, and just found out she is pregnant with twins. Jane researches the cost of childcare for three children and discovers that the rate for a full-time nanny of three children is $24/hour.
- Because of her executive duties, Jane estimates she needs at least 60 hours of childcare per week.
- Jane calculates it will cost her family $75K in after-tax money to pay for the childcare needed for her to return to work after her maternity leave.
- Jane’s take-home pay after tax is $77K, since she and her husband earn enough to put them into the 35% Federal and 10% California State income tax bracket.
- Jane calculates that she is making a net effective income (post childcare expenses) of $2k.

Jane is making what most Americans would classify as *a lot of money*. However, it doesn’t feel like a lot of money to Jane when she takes the after-tax childcare costs into account. Jane tells me, and I quote (Jane is not her real name by the way), “I feel like I am working my *ss off at work and barely seeing my kids, just so I can pay my nanny….it’s frustrating and I wonder every day whether it’s worth it.”

Of course this is an overly simplistic model of calculating the ‘cost’ of a working mother’s time. I fully acknowledge it does not take into account the emotional, psychological, and long-term professional career benefits of a woman’s work. However, this is the simple ‘back of the napkin’ calculation that every mother makes while weighing in on all the factors regarding the ‘working mother’ vs. ‘stay-at-home mother’ decision in her mind and heart. I made this calculation myself, and thank goodness with the help of my husband realized that I am a way more happier person and a better mother while working than when not, which also needs to be factored into the equation.

However, the reason I highlight this calculation as part of my blog is that it’s not something we women and mothers feel comfortable talking about out in the open. I think we need to talk about it more, actually. When I look at all the successful women in Silicon Valley running technology companies at the C-Level, I know for a fact that ALL of these women have full-time nannies, au pairs and often a multitude of care providers at home (housekeepers, gardeners, family assistants to pay their bills). None of these women are wives to stay-at-home dads, in fact many of their spouses are also busy executives. They can afford to be successful at work AND they can also afford to work while someone else takes the role of caregiver of their children. They make enough money for the working mom’s cost equation to make sense. However, below a certain threshold of salary income, there is a number at which making just enough money to pay your nanny doesn’t really add up.

Not every family has the luxury of hiring an au pair, still the most cost-effective childcare option (under $10/hour regardless of number of children), since many families don’t have an extra room to house an additional person. Here is the cost calculation for an au pair:
Au Pair Cost Calculator
- $9,000 – program fee to au pair agency, including matching fee
- $250/week – weekly stipend to au pair for 45 hours of work
- $22K/year all-in expenses ($9.40/hr)

As long as childcare continues to remain expensive and cost inefficient for most working mothers making an ‘average’ income, the cost of returning to work after having children means that many mothers won’t feel that they even have a choice to be a working mother. We as a society miss out on more than just the productive contribution of these women to the professional world, our daughters miss out on mentors and successful role models of women who can have great careers and also have children who are well-cared-for.

What other factors should a woman weight in her decision to return to work? What work situations should she negotiate for that would make it easier to transition back into work after children? What kind of childcare support should women demand of their spouses in order to be able to work part-time or full-time? Should the spouse who brings in the most money be the one who ‘gets to’ work?

Your thoughts welcomed here!

First of all, every mom I know is busy. The term ‘busy mom’ is completely redundant. It doesn’t matter if you are a working mom, a stay-at-home-mom, new mom or almost empty-nester. Every mom I know juggles multiples schedules (her own, her kids, and sometime even her spouse’s) and never feels like she has enough time in the day. Being busy comes with the territory.

Second of all, I am always wary of investors and startup people who look at moms as merely another ‘market segment’ that will bring them dollar signs if they can convince moms that they need their products or services badly enough. I recently heard a startup founder/CEO refer to the moms in her salesforce as “1099′s”, which made me cringe…what a way to dehumanize moms into mere laborers yielding dollar signs and paperwork.

Yes, while moms control 85% of household spending (projected to grow to nearly $3 trillion annually by 2012), moms are more than holders of the purse and CFO’s of their family budget. Moms are also often chief childcare provider, chief nutritionist, chief logistics officer, master scheduling artist, and Jill-of-all-trades jugglers constantly striving to meet multiple demands from many people competing for time, attention and energy. What moms don’t have enough of is time, so companies that can help moms be more productive with their time or help filter out the noise so she can focus on what really matters will make a difference in the long-term.

Companies that take the time to ‘get out of the building’ and connect with real moms to understand their daily challenges, wants and needs will build better solutions to meet those needs. Companies who connect with moms by building authentic dialogue through social media instead of one-way marketing messages are the ones who will capture our valuable attention, win our repeat business, and build our brand loyalty.

Here are a few new companies who I think have delivered some great time-saving solutions for moms:

Citrus Lane delivers hand-picked baby items tailored to a child’s age directly to a mom’s mailbox each month, saving her trips to the store and precious time researching what to buy next. It’s exactly the kind of subscription-based baby products service I wish had existed when my twins were born, since I had to buy two of everything and didn’t exactly relish doing errands with two babies in tow. Kudos to the team at Citrus Lane for picking the best baby products for each stage and taking the guesswork out of what to buy for new moms.

Kiwi Crate is another time-saving solution for moms that both kids and grownups can appreciate. Kiwi Crate delivers monthly art projects for kids ages 3-6, including all materials and directions. I signed up for the monthly subscription, which is just $19.95/month and includes free shipping. Although we live a few miles from a Michael’s Arts & Crafts store, I can’t seem to shop there without spending over $100 per visit or feeling stressed out about how to pull together a simple creative art project for four-year-olds. It’s not that I’m not crafty or fond of DIY projects, but I have neither the time nor the creative energy to figure out how to be an art teacher to my twins.

Enter Kiwi Crate. We got our first box on a very rainy day last week, and the kids were so excited it was the first package they had both received with their name on it!

Here they are with our au pair, who was more than thrilled the box came with simple-to-follow instructions plus enough material for them to share and create their own dinosaur feet and fossil masterpiece. After they completed their project, they asked if they could ‘do another fun box’ and I told them they would receive one each month with a surprise art project delivered just for them. Hooray! They’re not the only ones who are cheering.

thredUP gives families an easy and inexpensive way to exchange kids clothing online. At the rate my kids outgrew their clothes in the first two years, I wasted lots of money and valuable time shopping for new sizes. We also had many outfits that went unworn or barely used that would have been perfect for selling on eBay, but seriously who has time to take photos and post listings for hundreds of pieces of clothing? Not me. Enter thredUP. For a small fee ($9 or more) you can receive a box full of gently used kids clothing in your child’s size. In addition, you get credit for shipping out boxes of your own child’s no longer needed clothing to use towards sizes you do need. Win-win!

What are some of your favorite mom-oriented products and brands? Drop a note here, and I’d be happy to include your comment or review the company in a future post!

My twins and I have been attending the same playgroup since they were just a few months old. We are now approaching our fourth-year anniversary as a playgroup, and have been meeting at each other’s homes every week for over two-hundred weeks! Unlike a book club, or an occasional playdate, or even a “Mom’s Night Out” event through the local parents club, our playgroup has been a source of constant contact, comfort, and community support for my girlfriends and our children.

Not only have we seen each other during our most sleep-deprived and hormonal early mothering days when we were all just trying to survive day by day, we have also shepherded each other through breast cancer, miscarriage, new babies, marital challenges, kids’ illnesses, moves away and back again, and much, much more. Our children have grown up witnessing a strong camaraderie among mothers, and have learned to lean on us grown-ups as ‘aunties’ or second moms. Our family playgroup vacations have now become a tradition, and proof that having thirteen kids under one roof takes a village to keep each other sane!

We’ve talked about feeling fortunate that our group of moms just ‘clicked’, even though the circumstances that brought us together over four years ago were completely random and unplanned. I’ve heard of some playgroups that didn’t work due to personality conflicts, clashes in parenting style, or perhaps just because there wasn’t enough momentum to keep it going. Even though we don’t always agree with one another, we do agree to support each other in our lives, celebrate each other’s triumphs, and help pick each other up along the bumpy road of parenting. Perhaps it was our commitment to ‘showing up’ for each other as adults, and not just for our kids, that has kept our playgroup alive and thriving for so long. I’m not sure what the ‘magic formula’ is, but if I could bottle it up and sell it online I think it would be a hit! I’ve often thought about starting a parent-centered Match.com, the popular online dating site where my husband and I met each other, since meeting other parents or setting up playdates for like-minded kids is just so random. But that’s another post entirely.

I hope other moms realize that they too can find a source of connection and community for each other through playgroup, since parenting kids needs to be much more than just about keeping things fun for kids. Sometimes parents need to have fun, too! We can also help our kids learn by example the art of making new friends and keeping friendships alive, instead of just telling them how to do it.

Do you have a playgroup that supports you as a parent? If not, check out your local parent’s club for information on how to join a playgroup or start one of your own.

Playgroup Girlfriends in San Francisco

Walking with Dalu and tiger, Zion Wildlife Preserve

The sanctuary is home to several white Bengal tigers and cubs.

White tiger cub plays with us

I’m sharing it here because I think every girl and woman should watch it for inspiration and comfort, as a loving reminder of “women’s remarkable capacity to support each other, to laugh together, and to endure”.

The full text is available in the paperback edition of Kelly Corrigan’s memoir, The Middle Place.

This weekend my dear husband and I celebrated our fifth year anniversary in Sonoma and thought it would be fun to take another set of lessons on the flying trapeze from the Trapeze Pro, Marek Kaszuba. He teaches on a beautiful outdoor trapeze rig amidst towering eucalyptus trees at Sky Ranch, owned by author Sam Keen who wrote “Fire in the Belly” and “To Love and Be Loved”, which I count among some of my favorite books.

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If you’ve ever thought about taking a trapeze lesson, Marek is one of the best instructors to take your first flight with – he’s been catching people for over twenty-one years now, and is a master of the art. I took a trapeze lesson with Marek over ten years ago, just after Keen’s book “Learning to Fly: Trapeze-Reflections on Fear, Trust, And the Joy of Letting Go” inspired me to take my first lesson. I was living in London at the time, working a crazy double shift for a startup in the wireless space, and had just seen Angelina Jolie’s aerial ballet (or bungee ballet) from the Tomb Raider movie. I admit I was hooked on the idea of learning to do aerial ballet, and found out that I could take aerial classes at the UK’s premier circus school. l signed up for weekly lessons in static trapeze, then progressed to flying trapeze just before completing my overseas stint to come home to the Bay Area.

Upon returning home, I wanted to continue my lessons locally so decided to give Marek a try. Since I lived in San Francisco and didn’t want to drive up to Sonoma every week, I took occasional classes at the San Francisco Circus Center as well as Trapeze Arts in Berkeley. Both are excellent schools with solid instructors, but once you’ve flown in the warm outdoor air of beautiful Sonoma, there’s really no comparison with a concrete gymnasium.

I enjoy the flying trapeze for the same reasons I love watching Cirque du Soleil – each time I return, I am amazed by the incredible feats of daring and beauty that the human body can accomplish when given the right frame of mind and the proper inspiration. Here are some lessons I’ve learned from these fun but fleeting moments in the air:

However, as Sam Keen says in “Learning to Fly”, “Our greatest gift to the world may be in sharing what gives us the greatest joy”, so hopefully this small sharing has inspired something new in you today.

The film immediately draws you in with what becomes the film’s signature fast-paced, witty dialogue between young, hypersmart college kids. The opening scene captures a conversation between Sorkin’s version of Mark Zuckerberg (played by Jesse Eisenberg), an awkward Harvard undergrad hoping to get into a final club, and his short-lived college girlfriend played by Rooney Mara, at whom he proceeds to take the first of many intellectual and not-so-friendly jabs. Throughout the movie, Eisenberg’s Zuckerberg evolves as a smart yet insecure computer nerd trying very hard to fit in and yet always remaining on the outside of the social ‘in crowd’. In the end, he emerges as the world’s youngest billionaire, and yet the movie ends with him awaiting a friend confirmation from his ex, who no longer wants anything to do with him, despite his success.

Jesse Eisenberg’s acting is so brilliantly believable, it’s worth a best actor nomination, which would not be surprising at all. Despite Mara’s few scenes in the film, she gets to the deliver some of the movie’s best lines with sharp, comedic timing:
On how exhausting it is to date him, “It’s like dating a StairMaster.”

After breaking up with him, “Let’s just be friends” He: “I don’t need friends”
She: “I was just being polite, I have no intention of being friends with you.”

She: “Listen. You’re going to be successful and rich. But you’re going to go through life thinking that girls don’t like you because you’re a tech geek. And I want you to know that, from the bottom of my heart, that won’t be true. It’ll be because you’re an a–hole.” She walks off.

But the BEST quote from the whole movie, one that’s worth passing on to our kids, who are thanks to Mark Zuckerberg now growing up in the ‘Age of Facebook’ and ubiquitous social networking, is this: ““The internet isn’t written in pencil… it’s written in ink”. Indelible, magical ink.

The movie is worth seeing at least once, maybe twice. The pace is fast, the humor witty, the music and sound phenomenal, and the dialogue totally sharp and riveting. Even the least likable characters are entertaining, and while the movie is a brilliantly woven fiction wrapped around historical facts, there is no denying that the meteoric rise of Facebook (and of its founders’ fortunes) make for good storytelling. Watch the movie for yourself (opening tonight in theaters nationwide), and you’ll likely never look at Facebook the same way again, like it or not.

After the screening, we took a tour of the Tech Building and got to see the dubbing stage and the scoring stage where the Skywalker Sound folks weave their acoustical magic. When you watch the film, pay close attention to the audio soundtrack and you’ll notice how even during the noisiest bar and party scenes (of which there are many), you can still hear the dialogue between actors come through crystal clear.

Two thumbs up to Sorkin on a brilliant piece of perfectionistic filmmaking! I was thoroughly entertained, and could go back for more.

Here are two concepts from Brooks’ article that I wish my parents had shared with me back in high school:

1. “People aren’t happiest during the years when they are winning the most promotions.” I learned this the hard way after a fast track career that filled my pocketbook with money, my passports with many stamps, but ultimately emptied my soul in the process. The research proves that beyond a certain level of economic comfort, more money does not equal greater happiness, and neither do more promotions.

2. “…most of us pay attention to the wrong things. Most people vastly overestimate the extent to which more money would improve our lives.” It’s not actually money that enhances our happiness, but connection and communion with people.

After coming to realize these concepts through experience, I had a life-changing inspiration to leave the corporate world for several years, start my own business, and find a more balanced and happy life after climbing up a ladder that I later realized was leaning against the wrong tree (early mid-life crisis at 28, but that’s another post entirely…)

According to Brooks, “the daily activities most associated with happiness are sex, socializing after work and having dinner with others,” but not necessarily in that order.

Apparently commuting is the daily activity MOST injurious to happiness — so to all of you out there who spend an hour or more in traffic each day, read this sentence AGAIN and figure out if you can telecommute even just one day a week.

Oh, how I wish I had known this research before choosing to accept the three most hellish commutes of my life:
1. the 14-hour commute from Seattle to Taipei (AT&T Wireless International)
2. the 13-hour commute from San Francisco to London (SEVEN)
3. the 90 minute commute from San Francisco to Los Gatos (mobileID)

Hmm, what was I thinking? Clearly, I was not thinking about my happiness then…

The good news is my life is much happier now, and it has nothing to do with money. The top three things that contribute most to my happiness?

1. My husband. He’s amazing and I’m truly lucky we found each other (on Match.com nonetheless, but that’s also another blog post…). According to one study Brooks found, “being married produces a psychic gain equivalent to more than $100,000 a year” Note to married people: do not take your spouse for granted in favor of your job — it is not worth it, period. Jobs will come and go, but your marriage is sacred. Don’t take my word for it. The research is compelling says Brooks:

“Marital happiness is far more important than anything else in determining personal well-being. If you have a successful marriage, it doesn’t matter how many professional setbacks you endure, you will be reasonably happy. If you have an unsuccessful marriage, it doesn’t matter how many career triumphs you record, you will remain significantly unfulfilled.”

2. My toddler twins. They are pure love and joy and serve as the happiness bookends to the beginning and end of my day. I didn’t realize that unconditional love was truly possible until I became a mom.

3. My friends, many of whom I’ve met since becoming a parent and sharing this crazy life journey of balancing work, motherhood, marriage and self. My playgroup moms and I have been meeting weekly for nearly three years since our babies were born, and while we initially met to find friends for our kids, we are now an essential support group to each other as women.

Brooks quotes one study, which showed that “joining a group that meets even just once a month produces the same happiness gain as doubling your income.” My playgroup provides that happiness gain and has proven an indispensable support network that no parent should go without.

Looking at that “Happiness Pie” I created, I’m reminded why spending one less hour on work so I can be home in time to read stories to my children is definitely worth the trade-off in material or promotional gain.

Of the 15 hours of waking time I had today:
- 10 were spent doing meaningful and highly engaging work (spent the day at Social Media Marketing San Francisco listening to some engaging panelists talk Twitter, Facebook, and Split Testing);
- 2.5 were spent over dinner and a fun movie with my husband
- 30 minutes were spent having breakfast with my kids
- 30 minutes spent reading Facebook and writing this blog

Happiest part of my day? The 3 hours I spent connecting with my family. 20% of my day contributed to 80% of my total happiness meter. There’s my 80/20 happiness equation. For today, anyway…

What does YOUR happiness pie look like, and how will you change it next week?