Super Mommy!

Splitting time between Mom duty and news anchor duty, KY3's Maria Neider has a passion for both her hats.

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Photo Edward Biamonte KY3's Maria Neider and her husband, Scott, work opposite schedules, so each gets to spend half the day with baby Luke.

KY3’s Maria Neider pulls triple duty as a mom, a wife and a morning news anchor, and she says the daily schedule for her family of three has her excited about mommyhood with a new respect for working parents. She works 4 a.m. until noon, while her husband, Scott, works as a KY3 director from 2 p.m. until 11 p.m. They split time with their 10-month-old son, Luke, so they never need day care. What’s life like inside the hectic Neider household? With little Luke cooing in the background, Maria tells all about it.

Maria: I get up around 3 [a.m.]. Usually closer to 3:15 after hitting the snooze. I’m nursing, so I have to pump then. Then I try to tiptoe around and get something to eat and get dressed without waking up the baby. I get to work at 4. If there’s breaking news, I get there earlier than that, 3:30 or even earlier if there’s a tornado outbreak, severe weather, if I’m going to be out in the field. [...] From 3 a.m., it’s nonstop. But it keeps you busy. Your day flies. Then I have the baby to come home to. [To Luke] Hi! You know you’re the baby!

When I get home, I try to maybe eat something real quick. Tell Scott any interesting things that happened at work to let him know what he’s in for when he gets in, and then recap what the baby has eaten. Then I try to just go straight to bed and take a nap. This is our secret system. Scott tries to put Luke down for a nap, so that hopefully extends my nap. So that’s our little plan. Sometimes that works.

Scott: You get what, an hour nap?

Maria: Usually. Sometimes Luke wakes up 15 minutes after Scott lays him down. He leaves at 2; Luke’s up at 2:20. The rest of the day is feeding and trying to catch up on laundry. I keep trying to make him homemade baby food. It’s not really working out. It’s easy to do the bananas, obviously. I’ve done roasted squash and beef with carrots. But I have a whole new respect for parents and especially working moms and dads because you really realize how valuable your time is and how much you wasted it before baby. You really have to [have a routine]. I try to make dinner for us every night. Scott comes home for a dinner break at 7, and that’s our time together on a weeknight. So I try to make us a healthy dinner so at least when he comes home we can sit down and relax and get caught up on a few things.

Scott: Well, it seems to be usually I come home to eat, and she’s feeding the baby and puts him to bed. By the time I’m done eating, she gets a cold meal.

Maria: You know that part in A Christmas Story where he says, “My mother hasn’t had a hot meal in however many years”? It’s so true. And it’s not that I mind. I don’t mind having a cold meal. Your priorities really do shift around. But you know, sometimes it’s tough, and there’s no shame in going and picking up a chicken that’s already done or ordering the occasional pizza. We try to eat healthy, but the convenience can really be a luxury sometimes with our schedules.

On the weekends, there are so many things you want to do, but at the same time you want to just sit around and do nothing. We actually had Brandon Beck watch Luke overnight because we attended the Heart Ball, and that was our first night away from him, and he stayed the night over there. And that was really tough to be separated. Brandon ended up rocking him until after midnight. Brandon has three boys, so he’s a pro at it.

Scott: Brandon’s probably more qualified to watch him than we are.

Maria: (laughs) Yeah. We joke around about that. But our weekends are precious time.

Scott: Sometimes we try to take turns…

Maria: …giving each other a day.

Scott: One of us watches Luke, and the other takes care of what they need to do.

Maria: We’re working on, little by little, making renovations [to our home]. We had two layers of wallpaper in some of these rooms. And Scott’s doing the crown molding in the dining room right now. So those projects take a while. This wood paneling is…

Scott: It’s on the way out.

Maria: It’s on the way out, but now who knows, with the baby. Our one complete room is the nursery.