Back when I was single, there was a period of time between graduating from college and dating my wife when my schedule was simple. I was at work Monday through Friday, 8:00am until 5:00pm. And that was that.

Since I've married a pastor, that's not my schedule anymore.

Obviously I wouldn't trade my current life for the world. Our schedule has been an evolving one (I can say "evolve" with pastors in the audience, can't I?), changing drastically with each new kid that comes along. We're using the toddler plus infant version at the moment.

I still work a regular job, and it's still a Mon-Fri, 8am-5pm deal, with the rare project or on-call work that extends beyond that. That's my schedule.

My wife, on the other hand, has a nearly completely opposite schedule, and it's not so simple.

Sunday, obviously, is the busiest day of the week. Very early AM sermon & PowerPoint finishing touches. Early to the church, pre-service meetings, worship & service, and post-service meetings. Frequently there's a lunch meeting where we're trying to keep quiet 2 kids who are overdue for naps. Many Sundays are followed up with late afternoon meetings, phone calls, and prep for Monday. Once a month there's an evening worship service to round off the day.

Saturday is filled with sermon prep, and office work (at the home office) that didn't get done during the week. Also the occasional technical issue with something Audio/Visual that she wants to do during the service. (You'd think that playing a downloaded video clip with be trivial- but that's another article...) While it's hard to quantify, Saturday is also highly important as a "get into the mindset of Sunday" day. Unless you've seen the behind-the-scenes results both ways, it's hard to appreciate the importance of this one.

Back when we had our first child, me wife turned half of her office into a nursery. Meetings were held in hushed voices during nap time, and occasional "help, momma!" events interrupted daily events. To keep the kid entertained, we had to increase our toy budget.

This worked OK until he turned about 2. Attention needs rapidly grew greater, and nap times grew shorter. It wasn't fair for the kid either. The addition of kid #2 made another schedule change necessary.

Now weekdays are a mix of at home and at office days. At home days are a random mix of home-office appointments, telephone meetings, writing class materials, etc, all with 2 kids running lose in the house. For some reason, these days are not the most productive. I've been told stories of her trying to give a counseling session (with deep emotional issues), while the eldest child is literally climbing on the head of said counselee.

Office days we have a friend do baby-sitting for most of the work day. (We both have philosophical and financial aversions to daycare.) In reality, she needs to do a week's worth of pastoral work in these 2 days. Hospital visits, counseling, meetings with various leaders in the church, working on moving forward long-term visions, organizing missions trips, prayer meetings, etc.

For all of these weekdays, I'm free in the evenings. She has 2 evenings a week filled with a midweek evening service and an evening class on hermeneutics or church membership. That leaves free 3 evenings a week, which often get filled with leader's meetings, board meetings, and "it's been forever since we're had dinner with the what-their-names".

The net result is that she's working (productively or not) 6 days a week and most evenings. Friday we try very hard to keep free as her Sabbath.

For me, as a pastor's husband, that means that many evenings I'm expressing my love to my wife by keeping the kids out of her hair. Sunday "mommy is working", so I'm keeping track of the kids until we get home. Same goes for any evening event she's leading. Im also able to help her out by letting her leave early to the church, with me dressing & packing the kids in the car- showing up closer to the start of service.

As a pastor's husband, I sometimes have to step in as the head of our house and declare Nothing shall be scheduled this Friday. Nothing. Good healthy boundaries are often needed to keep us both sane.

As for house work, we've really a two full-time jobs home. That means we really have no choice but share chores. We've got a good balance worked out, and we're both happy with who does what. (Have I mentioned that she won't let me near the laundry? Hey, I didn't have THAT many pink t-shirts as a bachelor...) We're both looking forward to the day when we can get our kids to start helping with chores.

Family and friends don't always understand our schedule. We often get invites to events that take place Saturday or Sunday- regardless of the number of times we tell them that those days just don't work well for us. The often-shifting weekday evenings we have free don't often work for their schedules. Friday night is a frequent compromise that works, but then theres that pastors Sabbath thing.

Because of our irregular schedule, we do something that I haven't seen any other family do, but it works for us. When we want to do something fun, be it alone or with some friends, we impulsively schedule things at the very last minute. This does involve coordinating (for example) dinner reservations and babysitting an hour (or less!) before heading out. We once scheduled 2 week long overseas vacation, leaving the then only kid behind with a crazy schedule of friends & family- all with under a weeks lead time. Now, it doesn't always work to be impulsive. About 25% of the time our plans fall through. Sometimes it feels like I'm living in an episode of "The Amazing Race" when were trying to get an evening put together!

Well, that's what our schedule looks like today. It's the result of years of adjustments, many discussions between the 2 of us, and a few board meetings. The board has been very understanding that traditional office hours just won't work for us, so it's just been a matter of finding what works best.

As the baby turns into a toddler, we'll be changing it again. When the eldest goes into kindergarten, it'll change again. As the church grows and classes/events change, we'll change schedules again.

We've tried asking around it see how other people pull off being a female senior pastor with kids. We haven't found any good advice yet, and there appears to be no books or resources on the topic. We wish there was! So for now we're just winging it. If you try to schedule something with us, please be understanding if we have trouble finding a time that works for everyone...