Write it!!

My sister tells a hysterical version of what it was like to do homework when we were kids with my mother.  It often involved us doing it at the last minute with my mother dictating what you would write with a shrill "Write it!!!!" if you posed any hint of thinking about the words before putting pen to paper.  Although we might have thought what she had to say was wrong it was better to just write the nonsense than hear that command again.  She didn't care if it was right, she just wanted it done.  For crying out loud!  Didn't we realize that she once worked as a teller in a bank? Didn't that give her all of the knowledge one would need to finish a 4th grade essay on the Revolutionary War????

My perspective on motherhood has changed somewhat since my days as a child.  I can now see that some of her exasperated anger was misdirected at us.  I believe that she felt guilty for not making us do the homework ahead of time.  When you wait until the last minute...patience is not a luxury!  I believe this because HOMEWORK WITH YOUNG CHILDREN CAN BE A VERY PAINFUL EXPERIENCE!!!

There are times when my oldest is just cooked after a long day at school and homework time seems like the hardest task a person could ask me to do.  I sometimes give in and say that she can do it in the morning.  Always, when daylight emerges and there are breakfasts to eat, hair to comb, clothes to put on (a whole separate blog, trust me) I regret my decision to let her put off the homework and fight off the urge to scream...."WRITE IT!!!"

The Lonely Sock Club

  When I was a child and my parents would go away overnight my Grandmother would come to stay with us.  One of the "fun" activities on the agenda was a "sock hop" where she would put every unmatched sock that she could find in our household of 7 people and put them on my mothers bed.  We would then take on the task of pairing them off and turning a king sized mountain into what seemed like millions of pairs of socks.  It always seemed unbelievable to me that so many socks had not made it into the laundry at the same time!!

Now, I have a family and THERE ARE NEVER ANY SOCKS FOR MY CHILDREN!!!! I am not sure how my children have managed to lose the thousand or so pairs of socks I have purchased but...matched socks are always very hard to have an abundance of! I manage to get mine and my husbands into the wash with a 99% match rate, why can I not do it with my kids? It is very frustrating when my children are sent to their rooms to get dressed for the day and all I can hear is the bellow that they can't find socks?!?! For goodness sake, I have done ALL of the laundry!!!! Where can they be?????

In the toy bins, beneath the couch, inside of shoes, with the crayons?! These are just some of the places I have found lonely socks.  How does just one get lost?  Are they walking around in just one sock and I am not noticing it? I guess the answer is yes. I thought I was paying attention!

So, until my kids can take off two socks at a time and put them in the hamper, I have a place above my washer for those without a mate. There they will sit like a teen aged girl anxiously waiting for a date to the prom until they eventually get turned into dusting mitts. 

Packing Time

Now, I am by no means an organized person. You are invited to come knock on my door at any time and my house is pretty neat.  By no means and I mean by NO means are you to open any cabinets or drawers and under NO circumstances should you open the door to my laundry room. If you follow those rules, we'll get along just fine.  Sadly, I must admit that  I am a SHOVER.

So, when vacation time rolls around and it's time to pack my family of four up to hit the road? In a nutshell...it's a problem.  I don't have labeled bins and baskets or a fancy color coding system, I have my mind and where I think something may be.  I generally do OK if nobody is watching me round up bathing suits from a backpack of long forgotten items.  I can run the floors of my house (utilizing each one) to gather the necessary items. Locating sunglasses in the linen closet or sunblock with my spices.  There might be a few trips here or there to the store to find those must haves that I know we possess but cannot find. (they surface again...but not until it's too late!) The point is, I get it done. I'm just SURE that it could be faster and easier!

Every time I do this I think to myself, that this is the last time. I am going to come home from vacation and find a home for everything. But then...I get home...the explosion of the suitcases makes me feel chaotic and pressed to have my veil of neatness regained (what if you came to the door?) So what do I do? Shove it back where it fits.  Hopefully I will help myself by doing it some day but until then? I'll just keep on shovin'. 

"What's for Dinner?"

"SPIT!!!"....this is the answer my mother would give me as a child when I asked her least favorite question, "What's for dinner?"  I always felt that she was a little bit melodramatic with her answer. In MY mind...this was not a hard question and quite frankly, it was her job! Now, as a stay at home mom...I GET IT!!!!!! 

Now, let me be the first to admit that my meals are generally not very exciting.  They often repeat themselves....they need work.  I have noted it and on occasion I even try new things (that never turn out to be success stories). It's not that It's hard for me to come up with something for my family to eat for dinner. It is simply that I don't want to hear the barrage of complaints when it is not exactly what one or all of the other people in my family is in the mood for! I have a problem that many stay at home parents in my shoes probably have too. I have 1 child who eats nothing, 1 child who will eat pretty much anything I give her and 1 husband who eats delicious lunches everyday with which my food will never compare in a positive way.  BUT...the job of dinner is mine. 

So, as I prepare a dinner and the famous question is asked of me and it's answers are met with moans, groans and rolled eyes  and when my husband meets my answer of "taco pie" with a look that says, "you stink at this job"?  What do I REALLY want my answer to be?..."SPIT!!!"