What do working parents do to 'earn' more time? (method, play, children)

[skris4]

In the mornings I cook, pack our lunches while he gets he ready. In the evenings I bring her home and work on dinner while he takes her to the park or she plays near me in the kitchen. My spouse and I realized that we get to spend about 3 hours with her between us most days. We came up with some changes to get more time. We hired a cook to come in twice a week. This way I never have to cook lunch and couple of times a week dinner too is not on my mind. Both these days I get to play & spend time with her.
I am curious if households where both parents work employ some methods to get more time with their children. Please share your suggestions.

[Hopes]

My neighbor cooked all of the week's dinners on Sunday. She'd refrigerate and freeze meals to use throughout the week. That way there was no cooking. She simply had to heat up dinner, which is what you have to do anyway with a cook.

I worked when our children were young. My husband and I cherished our weekends with our family. Together, we'd do all of the housecleaning and laundry on Tuesday and Wednesday nights, and we'd pack the car so we could take off as soon as we arrived home on Friday after work. We'd spend the entire weekend away at our camp just being together as a family. There were no distractions because there was no electricity. We'd boat, fish, swim, bike and have big bomb fires every night.

My husband and I would take turns cooking dinner on Monday through Thursday nights. That meant we each only cooked twice during the workweek. I kept my meals to things that could be ready quickly. Stir-fries are great for this. Meals that took a long time to cook in the oven, like meatloaf or roasts, were actually less time intensive because the prep time was minimal and I wasn't a slave to the kitchen while dinner was in the oven.

I know many families use crockpots. Although they still require prep time, I like the idea of stealing time from other parts of the day for prep so evenings are easier when arriving home from work. But I only like a few things cooked in a crockpot so I couldn't use that as my norm.

[Meyerland]

Originally Posted by skris4

In the mornings I cook, pack our lunches while he gets he ready. In the evenings I bring her home and work on dinner while he takes her to the park or she plays near me in the kitchen. My spouse and I realized that we get to spend about 3 hours with her between us most days. We came up with some changes to get more time. We hired a cook to come in twice a week. This way I never have to cook lunch and couple of times a week dinner too is not on my mind. Both these days I get to play & spend time with her.
I am curious if households where both parents work employ some methods to get more time with their children. Please share your suggestions.

I used to go grocery shopping at 5:00 a.m. So I could spend more time with my family.

Some people work through lunch so they can get off at 4:00 instead of 5:00.

I would never cook one meal. I would either make it a double or triple batch. Sometimes I would make two different meals at the same time. Then you just freeze the extra meals. So you just have a dirty kitchen and have to cook a few nights out of the week.

Clean the kitchen while you are cooking. Place dirty dishes straight into the dishwasher. Run if it's full and then unload before bed.

Leftovers are your friend.

Deep clean one room per night, the rest just get straightened except the kitchen. Take all of your cleaning supplies in one bucket. Get into a system to clean faster.

Here's an example:
Bathrooms: spray tub, shower, and toilet. Let soak. Spray and clean mirrors and counters. Then clean the tub, shower, and toilet. Sweep/mop the floor and take out trash. 15 minutes if you apply a lot of elbow grease.