How do you balance your own needs against those of your family's? My kids are 2.5 and 6 months, and I frequently stay up late to work on personal projects or even just drink beer and watch TV. Its hard being tired the next day, but the alternative is never taking any time for myself.
I did that for a long while ... and eventually decided that I preferred the alternative to being tired all the time ;)
Took a long time to realize, and of course YMMV. I had kids younger than most of my peers (~10 years early, when I was 20 ... it was all planned, perfectly on schedule), so when a few of my friends' wives became pregnant recently, I gave them all the same advice -- to give yourself time and space to learn how to integrate this new aspect into your life. I went into it trying to maintain my "me time", with side-projects, writing books, making games, reading/writing blogs, participating in online communities (/. at the time), etc ... and I burned out, so my advice to them (and to you) is to learn how to re-balance your priorities. Beer and TV will kick your ass the next day if you stay up late, and eventually it'll catch up to you. Better to go in cycles ... have some "benders" from time to time where you hang out with friends, play games, drink beer, watch TV; and then have a stretch of time that you go to bed at a reasonable (and consistent) hour, exercise, etc.
