Homeschooling and Housework...can a girl be successful at both?

Let me start with this...
The above picture is NOT my house.
I repeat, NOT my house!

Though things are quite askew around here,
it's not quite that bad.

We are, however, knee deep into school
and the housework does, indeed...suffer.
In fact, it suffers greatly.

So here's the subject for our latest discussion:
Do you have any *magical* advice or
system that helps you keep things neat and tidy
while also homeschooling?

Now listen,
if your house is, as mentioned above,
neat and tidy,
I will require you to submit a picture.

Ok, just kidding.
Sorta.
Actually, it would only depress me if I knew any of
you actually had it ALL together.

So, let's go....
Do you schedule your housework?
Do it as you can?
Save it for Saturdays?

What's your method to control the housework
madness while homeschooling?

dealing with distractions

Even though we have just BARELY started our school
year, the distractions are already present...loudly present.

I'm not sure there is a simple solution to this problem...
because some distractions are necessary
(Dr. appts., trip to the post office, etc.),
then some are just so tempting to welcome with open arms,
aka, a call from a friend.

In the past, I've tried to keep our focus but never
really made a big deal of getting off track
with our school work,
but this year is very different because both of my
students (well, the two I have at the moment) are
high schoolers and they really must work hard to get
all their subjects completed by the end of the year
in order to have a full and impressive transcript.
And I DO NOT want to work into the summer.

So, does anyone have a great solution to this?
Do any of you do 4-day weeks in order to
put those errands and Dr.'s appointments on the
5th day?

Do some of you simply require your students
to do "homework" in the evenings?
I really try to avoid that but I think it's going to happen for us this year.

Your thoughts?

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pre-schoolers

I would love to hear how some of you handle your
pre-schoolers while you are trying to get
school done with your older kiddos.

Lucy has thoroughly enjoyed the big fat
workbook that I bought for her at Sam's...
though she doesn't exactly do it correctly...
but, who cares.

But that only carries her over for a short time.
She loves watching TV (of course)...which
I always feel guilty letting her do but golly,
it's such a life saver sometimes!!
The good thing is she really only likes videos
that have singing and dancing in,
so she can fully participate.
I count that as exercise...and exercise is good, right?!

Having a little one around is still so new to me,
especially when it means trying to
keep her occupied with something meaningful
while teaching my boys.

Any suggestions??