Working from home is a blessing for many, especially families. But, it can also be quite......interesting! There are a lot of pitfalls that are unique to home offices, and, a lot of tricks to avoiding them; hence the reason for this hub!

As a person with experience working from home, I thought it would be helpful (and fun!) to share some special tips with you that will likely make working from home easier, and more productive than ever. So, read on and hopefully, you'll find some new ideas that will work for you!

The best piece of advice I could ever give to a new "work at homer" would be -

It's really important (and sometimes difficult) to keep a balance between work life and home life.....because now they've almost become one and the same.

But, they aren't one and the same, and you have to make sure to schedule time to take care of each as needed. Otherwise, it's often very tempting to allow home life to distract you from work life, and come the end of the week, you've hardly put in any hours "at the office"! Your work at home opportunity will only be successful if you actually....work! 

At the same time, you've got to be sure you get a real break from work, when you're done, you're done; no going back for just a "few more minutes'!

When you set up your home office, you'll want to integrate some of the resources that big offices use to make doing business easier. Having access to things like a fax machine, copier, and of course a good phone system is essential.

There are small copiers, even copiers combined with fax machines, that will fit nicely into a small office space. They can't handle huge jobs, but you can always use the local copy shop if you need to.

As far as the phones, you can get a separate phone line installed at the house that's just for your business. This way each time a call rings on that line, you're sure to answer professionally....as opposed to one of the kids picking up the phone, or even you answering in your "home" manner because you don't know it's actually a business call.

There are also online phone systems available. These systems (like Vonage or RingCentral) often offer services that can provide you with 800 numbers, online faxes, extra phone extensions, sometimes even programmable "assistants" to answer and "route" your calls. And, to help defray the costs, you can often find a Vonage, or RingCentral referral code. This way, you can appear like a larger company right out of your home but without going over your budget!

Whether you keep it in a planner, on a calendar, on a dry erase board, wherever, you need to keep a "To Do List".

For one, it just helps you make sure you get everything done in a day that you need to.

It also allows you to easily see what you got done in a day because you get to check off something from your list each time it's completed....checking an item off gives you a nice feeling of satisfaction too!

And, keeping a "To Do List" helps keep you focused in your work and gives you a framework with which to begin and flow through each day.

Unless you live alone, when you work at home, well meaning family members often forget that you really are working.

As much as having your family nearby is a great benefit of working from home, sometimes, it can also be a costly distraction!

So, when you begin working from home, or, if this is a current issue for you, the best thing to do is to just sit down and talk with all the members of the house. Chances are, they probably don't even realize that they are intruding on your abilty to work. And, this gives everyone a chance to talk about the situation and what it means for them. You may be surprised how your working at home can effect each family member.

As much as it's easy to get distracted when you work at home, it's also easy to get extremely focused and all of a sudden it's well passed lunch time. I'm not saying that this is a bad thing as far as productivity and efficiency...even creativity is concerned.

However, you need to make sure that you eat and drink water regularly, and get up and move around, especially if your job is a sedentary one.

The thing is, when you work at home, no one else is going to be there with you telling you it's "break time". So, it's up to you to make sure that you take breaks at regular intervals during the day. You'll feel better for it!