About Me

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I have three fabulous children and a terrific husband. I was recently laid off and have decided to try the stay-at-home gig. We'll see how it goes!

Wednesday, January 29, 2014

Imagination Overload

Like most kids, my children have active fantasy lives.  They pretend ALL the time.  Sometimes it is really sweet, sometimes a little quirky and sometimes down right silly.  

Our oldest loves to play house, school and library.  She also likes to pretend to work.  She's always writing in notebooks or on scratch pieces of paper and always looks busy.  Every once in a while I take a peek in those notebooks and find all kinds of things.  Beautiful pictures of fairies and ponies, cute little poems or her thoughts.  Occasionally I find some useful information like, "I like Collin," or "I hope Santa brings me a bike."  But sometimes I find other things, like a drawing of her brother where he has been crossed out and "No Boys Allowed" is written beneath it.  Those notebooks are very eye opening.

Our littlest loves to play with her baby doll.  She takes that thing everywhere and loves to take her around the house for walks in the baby stroller.  The other night I was checking on her before going to bed and to my surprise she wasn't asleep.  Instead, I watched as she pretended to change her baby's diaper, gave her a kiss and tucked her into bed.  So sweet, I smile just thinking about it.  And then I noticed that she took the changing pad off her changing table, which is about 2 feet from her crib, and put it in her crib to use for her baby.  I still have not figured out how she managed to do that... hmmmm.

My son and I were playing with his cars in his room the other day and he started telling me all their "super powers".  He is borderline obsessed with super heroes these days, but not with specific heroes, more like specific powers.  Lightning McQueen had super speed, second Lightning McQueen had super strength, and Francesco Berrrrrrnoulli had the best power of all.  He had the power of super poop!  That's right super poop.  He could poop on anything to stop it, squash it, or move it.

A child's imagination is like a box of chocolates... you never know what you're going to get.

Monday, January 13, 2014

The Importance of Feeling Important

Yesterday, I was having a rough day.  I was feeling left out of church, left out of friend's lives and just plain left out of life.  I wasn't feeling important.  I know I'm needed at home, but I don't always feel needed.  My kids are too young to really appreciate what I do for them and what I've sacrificed to make our home life better.  Therefore, I don't feel overly important at home.  That used to be OK because I was important at work.  Man, it felt great to be needed; to have people running up to me asking for advise or help with a project.  I was important.

After talking all this over with my husband, I got to go to the grocery store by myself.  I love doing that.  I can actually look for better deals and use my coupons to their fullest value.  It's awesome.  It also gave me time to really think about my need to feel important.  I thought about people needing my help and being thanked for my help.  What I thought very little about was the actual helping part.  I enjoy that part.  I'm a "Martha".  If there's a task to be done, I'm your girl.  But what I finally realized is that I have plenty of that part at home with my family to keep me busy.  What my ego needed was people realizing they need me.  And when I thought of it that way,  I felt incredibly stupid and selfish.

As I was driving  home from the grocery store all I wanted to do was play with my kids.  I needed to make them feel important.  They are why I stay home and I want them to know I happily and without any regrets choose them over anything else.  Once I got the groceries put away, I joined my kids out on the trampoline.  It was so much fun!  I really have terrific, fun, outgoing kids.  And my husband and I are very lucky.

I must stress, however, that a woman who has had 3 children should NEVER, EVER, NEVER jump on a trampoline without leak guard protection!

Wednesday, January 8, 2014

Do They Believe Me

I sometimes wonder if people believe me.  I know I'm prone to exaggeration, but on the important things, I don't lie.  When my children ask me a question, (with the exception of SC, EB, and TF questions of existence), I tell them the truth.  I learned a long, long time ago that there is no point in lying.  Some one ALWAYS finds out.  But what do you do when what really happened sounds like a lie?

When my oldest was 2 she was hit in the head by a flying toy truck at daycare.  The toy truck was thrown by a boy sitting about 3 feet from her and was thrown with enough force that she immediately had a bump the size of a half dollar (no exaggeration, I have pictures) which was quickly accompanied by a bruise.  Later that night she exhibited some strange behavior, so naturally we ran our first born daughter to the ER.  I think we spent more time defending what happened then she did being checked out.  Five hours later she was fine and the staff was satisfied that we did not neglect or beat our daughter.

Today, I took my son to school after a long winter absence made longer by RIDICULOUSLY cold weather.  You can imagine that I was not thrilled to be dropping of a boy with a black eye. 


It's not super bad, but it's definitely a black eye and it's moved to that lovely green and yellow phase.  His teacher noticed it immediately and asked how it happened and I had to tell her.  The truth is, his 20 month old sister head butted him.  She gave me that polite, "Sure, that's what happened look", (at least that's what I thought she was thinking), and went back to getting everyone ready to learn.

Wednesday, January 1, 2014

Post-SAHM Depression

I believe there is a depression, similar to postpartum depression that happens to new SAHMS.  I always thought it was strange that in the days before my son was born I was extra emotional and couldn't let go of our daughter.  I would just grab her up, give her a big hug and cry a little.  Turns out, I was grieving the loss of our life as we knew it.  We spent nearly four years with just the three of us and it was about to change forever.  That life, a life I had loved and grown very comfortable in, was going to be gone as soon as my son was born.  The same thing happened right before our youngest was born.  That grief was completely gone however, as soon as the babies arrived and I was elated to finally meet them.

The grief I felt after losing my job, however, still lingers.  It's not terrible and only creeps up every once in a while, like when a friend gets a promotion, my husband publishes a book chapter or a journal article in a crazy awesome journal, or when my children say my husband must be smarter than me because he works and I, to quote my oldest, " just, you know."  For the record, my husband is smarter than me, but that's not the point.  I left a life where I felt large and in charge to start a life where I often feel like the servant.

Some friends of mine have recently become SAHMs and are experiencing emotions similar to the ones I felt almost 2 years ago.  There truly is a grieving process that happens when your life is completely changed, even if you choose that change.  The problem I found is that it could easily slip into a depression; especially if the change is not necessarily your choice.  I had a hard time pulling myself out of my own little pity party.  The world just doesn't put much stock in a woman staying home.  There are some who would say a SAHM is wasting her potential by not working.  Almost 2 years into this gig and I can tell you that's total hogwash.

I am becoming a much better version of myself.  I have become more patient, more caring and have found the value in just sitting with my children and really talking to them.  All of that has made us a much better and closer family.  I don't know that I would have found that if I was still working.  There would be too much to do.  I don't want to fit my children into my life, I want them to be my life.

It's hard adjusting to being a SAHM after being in the workplace.  The opinions of others and your opinion of yourself can really affect how you feel; a lot of times for the worse.  It's important to remember why you became a SAHM in the first place so when you're watching your 20 month old hit her older brother in the head with a plastic phone, you can smile through the screams and the tears and be proud that you are doing what is right for you and your family.