calithia

# September 30, 2009 at 11:03 am

Hey Chris… To start off I just want to say thank you and that I’m a huge fan of everything you’re involved in and I think css-tricks is one of the best go-to sources for anything web related. I find myself using your search box even before google’s when I’m researching some new web trick or looking to fix some ie bug. I especially love the new snippets section… it’s an invaluable resource.

So, to explain my subject line… How do you do it?!

How are you able to keep this site running as smoothly as it does and continue to provide such great content on a regular basis with very little guest posts (if any)? While working for a design firm, the addition of digwp.com, as well as all of your other web ventures, how are you able to sit there for more than an hour sometimes an put together another great screencast while not sounding rushed or burned-out at all? Do you work full-time, in house, at Chatman?

I ask these questions because I myself work full-time as the lone "web guy" for a mid-size ecommerce site and have recently (past year or so) started to dabble into freelance as well as launching some css/design/wordpress related projects. I have a million ideas and more freelance jobs coming in than I can handle but with a "regular" 9 to 5 job and two kids under 3 years old, I only have a couple of twilight hours to work on the "other" stuff.

So… how do you do it?

thanks — joe

P.S. I hope I didn’t take up too much of your time with this post. ;)

Rob MacKay

# September 30, 2009 at 5:41 pm

He does not sleep and owns a time machine.

Chris says "sleep is for the weak"

Matt

# September 30, 2009 at 6:53 pm

One day, Chris was designing for eight clients at once plus two of his own sites. He looked at the clock and said "There isn’t enough time in the day". That’s why we have 24 hours in a day.

Chris Coyier

# September 30, 2009 at 10:32 pm

It’s just a time thing I’m sure. I’m not married, no kids, no commute (I work from home). That adds up to a few extra hours than most of the rest of the world has =). And it’s not easy either, I’m not able to help people as one-on-one as much as I used to be able to, and I don’t put as much time into articles as I probably should. I do work full-time normally, but at the moment I’ve cut back to half time at Chatman Design while I finish the Digging Into WordPress book. That thing is such a monster it’s taking up a ton of my time right now. Once that’s out the door, the articles on CSS-Tricks will certainly get more in-depth again!

Even though you are busy, I think those few twilight hours can still be pretty golden for you. You just need to figure out what is the most important thing to you and focus those hours on that. If that means your own projects, you might have to drop the freelance. Or vice versa.

jackreichert

# October 1, 2009 at 1:24 am

he’s just being modest i’m pretty sure that Robskiwarrior is giving us the true inside story…