Mayhem and Magic

I Love This

Would you like to know how I started my short-term stint into stay-home motherhood?  I sent my kids to school.

It's been lovely.

I took them to school the last two days because I had a lot to get done, lots of errands and appointments that I've been putting off thinking, "Well, I'll do that when I'm off work."  Turned out that there was enough to do that I didn't want to drag the boys around with me. 

And we're paying for school this week whether they go or not, so...  They went.

Oh yeah, that's me: Mother of the Year!

Let me tell you, this is quite a gig.  I would be a GREAT stay-home mom of kids who are in school!

I'm almost packed for our upcoming trip.  The laundry is ALL DONE.  My floors are mostly clean. (Well, they don't crunch when you walk on them, so that counts, right?)  I bathed the dog and clipped his nails.  I chatted with my sister and my mom.  I spent 45 minutes this morning at a coffee place sipping tea and reading a book!  All by myself!  My nails are freshly painted, my hair is newly cut, and my legs are shaved. 

I've accomplished a lot, but I haven't felt rushed or harried. 

I actually made scrambled eggs for the kids for breakfast and we sat at the table and ate and chatted before we left for school.  Not that scrambled eggs are difficult or anything, but on weekday mornings were are a strictly toast-or-cereal family. 

This evening I played checkers with Sparkle and read books with Pumpkin.  Again, it's not that those thing never happen anyway but I didn't feel like doing those things with the kids was keeping me from getting other stuff done.  Does that make sense?

Anyway, tomorrow is their last school day.  Ask me in a month or so how I feel about being a temporary stay-home mom, but for the last two days I've been loving it!!

(Here's Pumpkin playing with his special kitty, Tessie PomPom.)

(Oh, and I forgot to mention that I got the boys these Kamik shoes as their second pair of summer shoes.  I think they'll be an okay choice...  I like sandals rather than closed shoes for breath-ability, and a covered toe because it protects both the shoe and the kid from damage.  Flip-flops are not allowed at their school, not that it matters this summer.)

News of the Week

1. This was the first week in the CSA season.  We got a bunch of spinach, cilantro, leeks, green onions, asparagus, and dried chickpeas, split peas and barley.  I have no idea how to cook chickpeas. Beloved and I are determined not to waste anything we get through CSA for the summer.  Many new recipes will be tried, I'm sure.  Yesterday I made a vegan split pea and barley soup.  It was...  okay.  Took forever on the stove-- three hours!  Can you cook split peas in a crock pot?  Today we had huge spinach salads for lunch.  It really was good, much better spinach than I have evereaten before.  We've both noticed a, hmm... a changein our digestive systems just a wee bit today.  (Is that TMI?)  I am annoyed with my body.  What, like it's never seen veggies before?  Have I been eating so few vegetables that my colon feels it must protest this dramatic change?  Sheesh...

2. This morning I turned on Sesame Street for the boys.  I got much more done in that one hour than I usually would.  When it was over I was in the middle of putting away laundry, so I just started another one off the DVR.  Heck, it's Saturday...  When that was over Sparkle said, "Please, Mom, can we watch some more TV?"  I told him, "No way, buddy, that was two hours!  It's beautiful outside, time to get your shoes on and head out."  And he said, "But, Mom, me and my brother like to melt our brains!" 

He didn't protest too much about turning off the TV though.  Later he told me, "Next Wednesday when it's my share time at school I'm going tell my class that I got to watch TV all day!"  I really, really hope he doesn't.  I'm counting on him forgetting by then about his magical two hours straight of TV time. 

I wonder how this summer will go.  It's not hard to leave the TV off at home generally, but of course we're at work and school most of the days.  When the boys and I are home this summer it might be different.  I'm going to try to avoid TV if I can, but I'm also not going to feel too horribly guilty if they end up watching more than usual.

3. Our neighbor's dog was killed by coyotes last week!  They took the dog for a walk out on a hill not far from our house and let him off the leash.  The neighbor lady said two coyotes came out of nowhere and killed him in a few seconds!  Holy crap!  Thank goodness their kids were not with them.  The coyotes didn't carry the dog off or eat him.  Maybe they were scared off by having people nearby or maybe the dog had wandered too close to a den or something?  Regardless, I think we'll stay out of that area.  Hmm, I think I just figured out why no one around here has outdoor cats.

4. We've been going to our church for about nine months now.  This is a lovely stage in our church-relationship, I must say.  We've been there long enough that we know people fairly well, we're not totally "new people" any more, but we're still new enough that we haven't felt like we have to volunteer to staff the nursery or anything like that.  Enjoying feeling mostly a part of the group, but not having to work too hard at it... 

We are lazy church-going people, apparently.  In my head I absolutely know that we must contribute to the community in order to be part of it, that service to others is 100% critical for anyone who says they want to be like Jesus at all...  But, dang, that "community" part is so much work!  So time-consuming!  I know that even if it seems mostly like an obligation at first that we will be happy to get to know people better and develop real friendships (and that even if we don't at first, it's not optional) (and I'm not sure yet in what ways we'll end up serving), but to be honest we're realizing that we've enjoyed the easy-ness of being on the fringe of involvement. 

Summer is Coming!

I've very excited about this summer.  I am taking three months off work! 

We're taking the boys out of school, going on a long vacation to Minnesota (where our families live), and spending lots of time with grandparents and friends.

I'm going to be a stay-home mom for 12 weeks!  I am thrilled and terrified.  I've always been fearful of being a stay-home parent, but even if it's awful it's only for 12 weeks. 

And it won't be awful!  It will be fun!  We'll have playdates at the community pool.  We'll go to the library every week.  We'll eat a lot of ice-cream and drink a lot of lemonade.  We'll sleep late. (I can hope, right?)  There will be swimming lessons and flip-flops and sprinklers and sunshine.  Whoo-hoo! 

One of the (many) reasons that I chose to work at a career rather than stay home is that I'm afraid I'll find that I'm too impatient and critical to be with my kids all day.  I like things to go as planned.  I like quietness.  When I think about being home with the kiddos not only do I think about missing my job and my paycheck, but I worry that it might not be the greatest thing for my kids because I'm annoyed all the time and shushing them too much. 

So I'll definitely be back to my job again in the fall, but I'm looking forward to the summer experiment.

I'm very, very blessed to have the opportunity to take three months off.  How many people can say to their employers, "Well, I'd like to just not work for three months.  You don't have to pay me, but I would like to keep all my benefits and I'd like my job to be reserved for me to return to when I'm ready."  I was really nervous even to ask.  But they said, "Hmm...  Sure, we can make that happen!"

I'm counting down the weeks!  Come on, summer!

Secrets

I want another kid.  We decided not to.  I am basically happy with the decision.  But...  My heart is constantly scheming to come up with ways to make it work.  I don't know if that means I'm nuts because I can't get it out of my head, and I'm torturing myself when I should be enjoying my family as it is...  Or if I'll regret it forever if we don't have another.

I am kind of lazy.  I want to spend more time just doing fun stuff.  Really, what I'd like is complete freedom to only do what I want to do and never have any responsibilites.  I'd also like to be able to do things like knitting or quilting or something without having to learn and practice.  Why can't I do that, huh?  I'm not reading as much as I'd like, I'm not running...  It always feels like we don't have time.  Part of me wants to shake the schedule up completely and Just Do It.  Part of me feels like it would be irresponsible and selfish.  Part of me is too lazy.  Part of me is just plain fearful.  

I swear sometimes, even around my kids.  I never swore, ever, until I went to college.  I thought when I had kids that I would stop, that having little ears around would motivate me to change.  But...  not so much.  Last week I hit my shin on a bed frame and said (not loudly, mostly under my breath) "Damn it, that hurt!  Piece of sh*t..." (Oh my word, now that I've typed that out it looks so silly.)  My mom was in the room and chuckled.  I asked her, "What?  Did my kids swear around you?"  (Kind of embarrassed-- this is my mom, you know.) And she said, "No.  But they're gonna one of these days."  My kids haven't heard me use nasty launguage all that often, but probably often enough that I'm going to regret it.  Funny, right now if they hear me say, "Stupid piece of crap" (You see?  I clean it up a little around them-- crap rather than sh*t, that's better, isn't it?  No?) my kids gasp and say, "Mom!  Bad word, bad word!  We don't say 'stupid!'  That's unkind!"

I want a big huge house, preferably on several acres with lots of trees.  This is clearly crazy.  I'm very well aware that I and my family consume more than our fair share of the world's resources.  I don't want the expense or the work of having a bigger house, and I don't want to be deliberately wasteful, but I just want MORE SPACE.  

I have a chocolate stash hidden in the pantry.  Sometimes when my kids want a snack I insist that they eat something healthy, and while they're busy peeling their bananas I sneak a handful of M&Ms.

I read the Twilight series.  And I enjoyed it.

Needing Help is Hard

We're going to have a little child care crisis this week.  Beloved will be gone most of the week, and I will be leaving the same day he comes home.  My flight leaves about six hours before his arrives.  So, what to do with the kids during those six hours?

One of Sparkle's teachers does occasional overnight child care in her home.  I don't know how often, exactly.  Apparently it happens often enough that it's worthwhile for her to offer that service for students at the school.  Most of the families have two working-outside-the-home parents, so I'm sure our situation isn't unusual.

Anyway, the current plan is for me to take the boys to school as usual that day.  At the end of the school day she will take them home with her, they will sleep (supposedly) at her house, and Beloved will pick them up in the morning. 

Our kids have never slept anywhere other than Grandma's house without us.  I'm nervous that they will either freak out with anxiety or melt down into horrible behavior at her house.

We do have some friends who live nearby with a son about Pumpkin's age.  Our kids have been to their house and played with their son many, many times.  They would probably be able to help us out.  I could drop the kids off at their house, and they could either sleep there or one of the parents could bring them over to our house to go to bed and then stay with the sleeping kids until Beloved gets home very late at night.

Option 2 seems like a much better choice for the kids.  The only problem is...  I cannot bring myself to ask our friends to help us.

I'm much more comfortable paying someone to watch my kids than asking someone to disrupt their own schedule for our sake.

I even wrote them an email, but couldn't send it.  I know we would absolutely do this kind of thing for a friend if need be, and we would be happy to be able to help them out in any way.  So why am I having so much trouble with this?

I Almost Had To Quit My Job This Morning

This morning Pumpkin woke up a little later than usual.  When it was time for me to leave for work, he was just sitting down at the table with Sparkle and Beloved, and Beloved was coaxing him to eat his breakfast. 

Pumpkin is very often (almost always) super crabby or super whiny before he eats in the morning.  He's so crabby that it's hard to get him to eat because nothing is right-- not enough milk/too much milk, too much peanut butter/not enough peanut butter, do it for me/I want to do it myself...  Once you can get two or three bites down him he turns into a different kid, back to his normal cheerful self.  It's very dramatic. 

I was doing the last-minute rush-around, grabbing my jacket, my keys, my lunch, my phone and my coffee.  Just as I was ready to go out the door I stopped and kissed them all.  Pumpkin was whining something at me but I couldn't understand him, so I said, "You'll need to use words, Pumpkin, because I can't understand you.  What do you need?"  And he turned to me, literally with two tears running down his little cheeks, and pointed to me as I was poised to exit right that moment and said quietly,

"You.  I need you."

.

(insert strangled, desperate sound from both me and Pumpkin here)

.

So I was a little late this morning.

.

As soon as I got to work (which was only about seven minutes after I left the house) I emailed Beloved and asked, "How is Pumpkin?  Is he okay?"  Of course he was fine. 

Very happily, I was able to leave work early today and picked up the boys just after their lunch time at school.  Today we've made cookies, played football, watched Sesame Street, and read books together.  Sparkle made supper for us and he was very proud. 

(It was Six Can Tortilla Soup. I opened the cans of corn, beans, chicken broth, and tomatoes and he poured them all into the crock pot.  He grated cheese and got tortillas and sour cream out of the fridge.  He set the table.  So...  Not that hard, but pretty good for a five year old, right?  I was proud of him, and he was proud of himself, especially when I told him he's going to have to be in charge of supper more often.  Five year olds are happy to do anything when they see it as being "in charge" of something.)

We've had a good day.  I'm glad I didn't quit my job. 

It was pretty close there for a few minutes, though.

Work, Money, Power and Parenting: A Long Introspection

The painting is underway.  The house is a disaster area.  The boys are crazy, though they are "discovering" toys they've always had now that the playroom is in chaos.

Beloved was able to finish up his meetings in time to grab an earlier flight and arrived home late last night.  I was glad to see him. 

I do appreciate that he managed to come home earlier than expected.  However, he called me from an airport yesterday afternoon (before he was even home) to say, "I just found out there's a dinner going on tomorrow [Thurs] night that I should probably go to.  Is that okay?"

At the time I said I didn't know yet if it was okay.  This morning he asked again and I said it was fine.  And it is fine.

So, he managed to get home early but he's still ditching the family to go out to dinner with colleagues.

Okay, so he's not really "ditching the family."  That's unfair.

(Did I mention about being on my own with work and kids?  And the house painting?  But yeah, go out to dinner. Have fun!)

Beloved's career tends to make a lot of last-minute demands on his time.  Like, "come for a meeting across the country in two days," or "go out to dinner with big-wigs that need to be impressed tonight" kind of demands.  My career doesn't do that.  There are definitely things that need to get done, like continuing education, conferences, testing, and training.  But many of those I can schedule whenever it works best for us.  My "stuff" tends to get put off until the last possible second because it can be put off.

I know that this is the life and the careers that we have both chosen together.  I know it's not his fault that his career is the way it is.  In fact, it means he's doing well that there are so many demands on him.  Obviously, I want him to do well and be successful.

But...

It does make me angry sometimes.  Beloved doesn't want me to be angry (smart man!).  He really, really does his best to give me as much notice as possible and he turns down or delegates as much as possible.  He has adjusted his schedule to both drop off and pick up the boys every day that he's in town.  But I can't pretend that it doesn't make me upset at times.  I have never tried to pretend that I'm 100% okay with it.

I think it's a power and value issue for me.  It makes me feel like his time is more valuable than mine, and his career is more important than mine, therefore my schedule and my time are often expected to adjust to his.

The bummer is that I don't think there is any great way to fix this issue.  Beloved is doing his best.  This is just the nature of our professions.

I've actually considered quitting my job or just working very part time!  (!!!!)  That option is appealing at times.  We've always tried to make sure that we plan our spending in a way that we could be okay if only one of us was working.  I would enjoy the extra time with the kids, it would probably give me more opportunity to connect with other moms, and I would have more time for myself (to start running again, for example).

However, the "extra" income is what pays for our plane travel to see family who live far away, home improvements (like the painting that is going on as we speak), and our trip to South Africa.  It provides what feels like a security buffer against financial disaster.  (I say that knowing that trusting in money for security is pointless, so that's a false hope.)

At times when it feels like I cannot emotionally support our family, his career, AND my career I like the idea of just giving up mine.  What if I could just focus on the kids?  What if Beloved were free to pursue his career without worrying about how it would affect my work? 

But... 

I like my job.  I like the fact that I have a meaningful career and income.  I don't know if I have the patience to be with the kids all the time. 

And would quitting (or cutting way back) on my job really help the power and value dynamic going on here?  (Or make me feel better about it?)  I sure doubt it!

Sometimes I feel resentful that anyone ever told me it was possible to have it all.  Sometimes I feel like a failure as a woman/Christian/parent because I am so nervous about my ability to provide sane parenting and a fruitful childhood for my kids if I were a stay-at-home-mom.  Sometimes I feel badly for contemplating working less. ("Lazy bum!  Lots of people work way more than you!  And they're happy and grateful to do it!" I say to myself.)  Sometimes I feel selfish for not tolerating Beloved's schedule better than I do.

No answers...  And so my pondering and whining continue, I guess!