Mom’s Nights Out
It’s been about a month since I’ve posted about any sort of special me time. I’ve been so busy just trying to keep up with the normal day to day stuff, plus organizing and tagging for two consignment sales, that there hasn’t really been much time for me to do something just for me. I suppose if I really examine my weeks, I could tease out some of the little things that I do just for me, but I particularly like being able to claim something that is a little out of the ordinary as me time. And now I can!
Last Friday, I left T in charge of the kids for dinner and bedtime and met up with a friend for dinner. It felt particularly good, as I was going out with one of my very best friends, who I don’t see nearly enough even though she lives right here in the greater Boston area. Between her rigorous work schedule and my busy life with kids and such, we hadn’t seen each other in over a month. So it was very, very nice to sit down together at a little Mexican restaurant and have some uninterrupted time to just chat and catch up. After we finished dinner, we headed out for ice cream. My flavor of choice was out, so I went out on a limb and tried something completely different (something I rarely do). The flavor I ended up with (it had an unusual name that I can’t remember) was okay, but I probably won’t get it again.
Then, as an added treat, I spent Monday evening out with another friend. We were supposed to go to a book talk together at our local library, but neither of us had finished the book (I didn’t even come close). So, we decided to spend the evening at Starbucks instead. Tiny and Buba are friends with this woman’s oldest child, and naturally, we spent most of the evening talking about our kids. But still, it felt great to have another night out filled with adult only conversation.
Keeping Me Busy
It’s all the usual stuff. The taking care of kids stuff, the housekeeping stuff, the part-time tutoring stuff, the going to the gym 5-6 days a week stuff. It’s all the stuff that needs to get done in any given day, that’s been keeping me busy and leaving me with little to no free time. And it seems that when I do finally have 30 minutes or so to myself, I just want to relax, watch a little TV (or Hulu or Netflix, as it always is in my case) or take a little nap.
I feel like it’s been this way for me for several weeks now. Just go, go, go all the time, with mostly just the “must-dos” getting done. And it’s made me realize that I’m not the sort of person who can handle a go, go, go kind of lifestyle all the time. I’ve been stressed, and cranky, and in need of some serious downtime with no obligations whatsoever.
I feel a little silly saying this, because I know that there are people out there with more kids and more on their plates who do it all AND make it look/sound so easy. But the cold, hard truth is that I am not one of those people. I need to find a way to create a little more balance between all the must-dos and some of the things that I’d just like to do for fun or relaxation. I need to find ways to carve out a little bit of pure me time that doesn’t also attempt to squeeze in a small chore (like paying bills while watching a TV show) or someone else’s needs. I’ve known this for a while. But it just seems to be so much easier said than done.
Oh, Let’s Go Fly a Kite!
T is on spring break this week, and with most of my students away for the break, we’ve had a ton of time to spend together as a family. I had really hoped we might have a week filled with sunshiny days, where we could enjoy lots of time at the local parks and playgrounds. Unfortunately, what we got was mostly a week of gray days with some rain here and there.
When Buba saw the the bright sunshine pouring through the windows this morning, he immediately wanted to go outside. He whined and cried as I explained that the weather was not actually as pleasant as it looked. With a high of roughly 53 degrees and some strong winds stirring up leaves, tipping over trash cans, and scattering recyclables all over our street, the day was less than ideal. But after days mostly filled with running errands and playing inside, T and I decided that the fresh air would do us all some good. So we grabbed a recently purchased kite and headed to a nearby field.** I sang the Let’s Go Fly A Kite song from Mary Poppins as we walked, but no one besides me seemed to get the reference (understandable for Tiny and Buba, but even T was clueless).
The weather was actually quite blustery, and I was a little concerned that there might be too much wind to enjoy some kite flying. But T did a great job getting the kite up in the air and then handing it over to Tiny or Buba (that’s the kite up in the top right corner, with T and Tiny on the bottom left).
Tiny really seemed to enjoy the experience. She ran like the wind, and did a great job (for a 3-year-old) keeping a good amount of tension on the string. Tiny took as many turns as she could get.
Buba enjoyed one good run, and then preferred to spend the rest of his time dropping pebbles into a small puddle.
I’m pretty sure a good time was had by all, including Pink Baby and Blue Baby (who Tiny found under the couch cushions of the love seat in the kids’ room!) who watched it all from their strollers. It was so much fun to see the kids enjoying the kite and running around in the field. I love that something this simple can be so much fun.
**As a funny little side story: After telling Tiny that we were going to go fly our new kite, she asked me, “But how will we get back down?” I told her, “We’ll use the string to pull the kite back down, so we can take it home.” She still looked puzzled and asked, “But how will I get back down to the ground? When Elmo flew a kite, he went up, up in the sky.” So, I had to explain how kite flying really works, after which, she seemed a little disappointed. I was glad to see that she found it quite fun after all once she got to running around with it in the field.
Missing
I’ve written before about how some toys just seem to magically disappear in this house. Usually they are small toys- like the Little People Goat (still missing) or the pink plastic butter knife (found!). But today, it was Buba’s beloved Blue Baby. Blue Baby has been with us for a least a year. He is twin brother to Tiny’s Pink Baby, and these babies go pretty much wherever Buba and Tiny go. We last remember seeing him at Stop and Shop yesterday afternoon, but we checked the lost a found there, and he was not there. Both T and I are pretty sure that he made it back home. But we’ve searched and searched and searched for Blue Baby, and he is nowhere to be found. We looked in all the obvious places, and then we looked in the least likely places. No luck.
It doesn’t surprise me when the small toys go missing. But how did we manage to lose a 12 inch doll? I really hope he turns up tomorrow, but right now, it’s not looking good. Fortunately, Buba is not really all that broken up over the missing doll. He’s asked where he is and has helped look (a little), but he hasn’t shed one tear and was easily convinced to take a stuffed rabbit with him when we went out this afternoon. Tiny however, is pretty concerned and continues to look. She’s worried that Blue Baby is sad because he doesn’t have his family.
Fortunately, Blue Baby is not one-of-a-kind and is easily replaceable. Still, if you happen to see him out in the world (a little dirtier than pictured below), please let him know that we miss him and would like him to come back home.
(And, yes, Pink Baby and Blue Baby are the actual names that they go by.)
Peep! Peep! Peep!
Yesterday morning, we spent about an hour at T’s school. One of the kindergarten teachers had invited Tiny and Buba to come in and see the chicks that had hatched in the incubator in the classroom. Both Buba and Tiny were very excited to go and see them. The teacher let them help turn the heat lamps on and off, pet the chicks, and they even got to put on plastic gloves and hold a tiny little chick (named Ducky).
After our visit with the chicks, we walked around the school and briefly visited some of the teachers and staff members. T’s colleagues were incredible supportive when Tiny and Buba were born. They sent delicious meals, gave extremely generous gifts, and one or two even helped with childcare. We were so grateful for all their help. I loved seeing Tiny and Buba flash big smiles and talk their ears off. They were pretty good about giving hugs too.
Tiny is already convinced that she will be going to Daddy’s school when she gets big (despite the fact that we live in a different town). Hopefully she won’t feel too disappointed when that doesn’t happen. They’re both so ready for preschool, and I know they’re going to have wonderful experiences there. Still, I’m not wishing for September just yet. I know it will come soon enough.
Chatterboxes
T and I put Tiny and Buba to bed at 7:30pm. It’s normal for them to chat for a bit before going to bed, but they’re still chatting right now. They don’t sound the least bit tired. I, on the other hand, am completely exhausted but have piles of laundry and other household chores to attend to. It just doesn’t seem fair.
It’s All Relative, I Suppose
I’ve never taken part in Multiples and More‘s question of the week prompts, but this week’s question has actually been on my mind for weeks. Maybe even months.
It’s been a little rough around here lately. Tiny and Buba have become fiercely independent and are no longer interested in following my agenda. They mostly want to do what they want to do when they want to do it. My efforts to assist them in anything are often met with a nasty sounding, “NO! I gotta do it!” And my requests are answered mostly with, “OK. But waita justa minute.”, which turns out to actually be no less than five minutes. There are numerous tantrums and meltdowns every day. I’ve been trying very hard be consistent with discipline, while also remembering to pick my battles and to give them a bit more of the freedom that they’ve been wanting. But so often it turns into a give them an inch and they take a mile situation. The days spent mostly just the three of us are so emotionally exhausting.
To be fair, we’re not battling each other all day every day. But more often now than ever before. On the weekends, when T is home to help provide a united front, things seem to go a little better. But last week was so tough that I considered applying for a full time maternity leave position for the months of May and June. After spending a day thinking about it, I decided against it. But it was the first time that I really considered going back to work full time before the kids start kindergarten. I thought about all the working mom’s who’ve told me that they are better moms because they work and started to understand what they mean.
I know that Tiny and Buba aren’t bad kids. They’re just three-year-olds doing what three-year-olds do. But it feels so hard to be their mom sometimes. And sometimes I worry that I’m not as good at my SAHM job as I wish I could be.
I guess I just thought things would continue to get easier as the kids got older. And perhaps, compared to the first year, things are. Most nights I get 6-8 hours of uninterrupted sleep (depending on when I get myself to bed), and that’s got to count for something. My kids can dress themselves and feed themselves (when they want to), and they don’t truly need me the way they did when they were infants. Still, right now it’s feeling pretty hard compared to where we were six months ago.
We’ve had our ups and downs before, so I know we’ll be back in the ups at some point. I just hope it’s soon.