I'm Not Sorry That I'm A Lousy Friend

I'm am genuinely excited for your upcoming wedding, baby, promotion, and everything else happening in your life, but...

I'm a mom.

I will not be the type of friend that stops by or calls you daily just to chat. On a good day, I will comment on your Facebook status about how great you look, but more likely than not, I will just click the "Like" button, put my phone down, and run off to do something with my kids. I am not the friend that will sit beside you and gossip about all of our mutual friends and acquaintances.

I do want to know about the exciting life events that you are experiencing, but I'm going through some of my own. Although you may not realize it, watching my son throw the perfect pitch or get that tackle or watching my daughters get a new best race time or landing their back handspring are all very exciting life events. They may not seem as important as a wedding or birth to other, but they are just as important if not more to my family. When I married my husband, we were overjoyed because we were committing to spend the rest of our lives together, celebrating our love for one another. This love became tenfold when we had our children. It was our love for each other that made us decide to get married and have children; that love is also the reason that every accomplishment our kids have is a huge life event for our household.

This is the reason why I come across as a lousy friend. My focus is on my husband and my kids. We didn't celebrate our love in marriage and the birth of our children, just to stop celebrating after those life events. My kids and my husband just won't take a back burner to other things. Five years from now, a friend won't care if I was helping them craft shower decoration for their baby shower, but my kids will remember sitting on my lap reading books. Ten years from now, a friend will not remember if I called or stopped by on a random Tuesday evening to say hi, but my children will remember that I was right beside them coaching their run club. Twenty years from now, a friend will not remember that I went out for a drink with them, but my husband will remember spending the evenings with me talking about our days after the kids have gone to bed.

I will be there for you if you need me. Are you moving? My husband and I will both be there to help you pack and move. I will be there for your bridal and baby shower and wedding. However, if one of my kids has a game, I will be at it and come to your event after. If you don't understand this, it goes back to the fact that our kids are the offspring of our love and they mean the world to us!

If you call me, I may not answer, but I will get back to you to talk. I do love being your friend, but my love for my husband and kids is stronger...I hope you understand this.

I have heard several times that if people are good friends, they will make time for you. This is true, but a GREAT friend realizes that making time for each other doesn't mean talking to spending time together daily, weekly, or even monthly. Making time for each other can be as simple as a quick text to say hi or asking how everything is going. Great friends realize that their friend's family will be their number one priority, and they won't be angry when their friend makes their family number one!

I am still the same friend that you have always had, I just have prioritized and my family is now and always will be my number one. I'm not sorry if you think that this makes my a lousy friend. I'm hoping that you are a great friend and realize that I am still your friend, too!

Do Stuffed Animals Breed In The Night?

Yes, I'm almost certain that they do!

I am sure that there are more stuffed animals in my kids' rooms when I wake them up in the morning than there were when I tucked them in the night before. And it's not just stuffed animals, it's all of their toys. I feel like we are in a constant battle. So, I developed a plan this last year to help combat this issue, and surprisingly it has helped. What is this magical plan, you ask?

1. Purge through the toys they have and throw out any toys and games that are broken, torn, or missing pieces.

2. Keep them in a box in the living room for two weeks. This one requires more from you, mom, as you will have to deal with the chaos of the toy box being in the living room for a couple of weeks. However, it's worth it! During the two weeks, the kids are allowed to play with whatever toys they want to out of the box, but they must put them away in their room after playing with them. IMPORTANT: they are only allowed to put toys back in their room if they play with them; don't tell them any more about this step than that.

3. At the end of week 2, look in the box. These are the toys that aren't really played with often enough to keep out all of the time. Now, take put the box in the trunk of your car and take them to donate somewhere...a shelter, a second-hand store, etc. If you do see a toy or two in the box that holds some sort of significance to you or your child, feel free to grab them out...limit yourself to keeping under 5 of these toys. Remember, they haven't been played with for 2 weeks!

At our household, we do steps 1-3 twice per year, every spring and fall. Luckily because we have implemented the next steps, we don't have as much to go through as we first did.

4. Set limits with yourself. I know that the $1 bins at the store call to your entire family; there's toys for the kids, home decor for mom, snacks for dad, and so much more. However, you don't need any of it. These toys will almost definitely be in the trash pile the next time you purge, so why buy them. And, I know that the clearance aisle calls to us in every store; nobody wants to miss out on a deal to good to pass up. But your child doesn't need that toy just because it is now 75% off. Limit new toy purchases to special occasions and maybe a spontaneous buy once every 2-3 months. I'm here to tell you, though, that your child will get more out of you taking them to the park, a play, a ball game, or any other experience than they will from a piece of over-marketed plastic.

5. Set limits for special occasions. If grandma, grandpa, aunts, uncles, cousins, mom, and dad all buy toys for every holiday and birthday, you will end up right back where you were before you purged. For my husband and I, we only buy one toy for birthdays and one for Christmas; other holidays are celebrated sans toys. Most of you have heard this before as gift guidelines: something to read, something to wear, something you need, and something you want. This works very well for kids to help put the act of gift giving into perspective, but it also works for adults. If we as adults stop to think about why we are giving the gift to begin with, it will help tremendously. We are giving the gift out of love. Well, overindulgence is not love and neither is giving into every whim. Stay strong with yourself and your loved ones on this guidelines, and you will be less likely to continue the perpetual cycle of multiplying toys.

I am far from perfect; I do allow the kids to go through the $1 bins at times. And they do buy junk toys, but sometimes they have been super diligent in their school work and chores and deserve that little something. And our daughter did get an entire collection of Wizard of Oz dolls for her birthday last year, but she can't be expected to play with Dorothy without the rest of the gang. However, if you keep the spontaneous buying and birthday presents to a minimum, you will find sanity upon entering your child's room, for it will no longer be overtaken by toys that are not be played with.

Oh....and perhaps separate the stuffed animals at night, so they can't breed!

Dear Mom At The...

Dear mom at the...wait. Stop!

 We've all seen them, and most of us are guilty of clicking on and reading them. You know those blog posts that we hope will make us feel better about whatever decisions we have made. Here's the thing, we should be happy because we are happy, not because some stranger has justified our choices. I don't care if you are the mom at the park on her phone, the mom at the park pushing her kid on the swing, the mom at the park socializing with other moms, the mom that isn't at the park because she is at work and the nanny is with her kids at the park, or any other type of mom at or not at the park.

 NONE OF THAT MATTERS!

 Here's what does matter:

• Do you see smiles on your kids' faces when they are at the park? You know that they are enjoying their time at the park. Do they love it when you push them on the swing or watch them go down the slide? Absolutely they do! But do you know what they enjoy even more? The fact that they are able to go to the park to play! I promise you that they will not look back on their childhood and say that they didn't have fun at the park because their mom didn't x, y, or z. Rather, they will look back and say that their mom is awesome because she took them to the park or arranged someone else to take them to the park while she was at work. 

·         Does seeing your kids enjoying themselves bring a smile to your face? When you catch them at the bottom of the slide, does it make you smile? When you look up from your phone or book or glance away from the conversation with friends, does it make you smile watching your kids? When the nanny sends you a video of your child going across the monkey bars, do you smile because you know the courage it took for them to do it? I bet you answered yes to at least one of these questions. If you did, then take joy in knowing that your kids have found joy in being at the park and take pride in knowing that you have made time for them to go to the park and just be kids.

·         Do your kids ask to go back to the park? If they ask to go back, then you must be doing something right? If you being there beside them as they go down the slide is ruining their fun at the park, then they wouldn’t ask to go back. I’m willing to bet that if you or the nanny tells your kids to get ready to go the park that they never complain. Rather I bet that they get excited and rush off to put on their shoes because they are excited to go to the park.

It really is that simple. None of us need the endorsement from a stranger (although it can feel good) that it is okay for us to be right beside our kids, sitting on the bench while our kids play, or at work while the nanny takes the kids to the park. The only things that we need to know are these three simple things: our kids are smiling, we are smiling, and our kids want to go back. There you have it mom…YOU ARE AWESOME, AND YOU ARE DOING IT RIGHT! But you didn’t need me to tell you that did you?

Enjoying The Little Things

 

• School
• Work
• Church
• Cooking
• Cleaning
• Yard work
• Volunteer projects
• Kids' private sports lessons
• Kids' team sports lessons
• Daily exercise
• Errands
• Etc...

This list is all things that we do as a family on a weekly, if not daily, basis. And, honestly, this list could go on and on. However, that isn't what this post is about; rather this post is about taking time out of all of this to enjoy the little things. I'll be the first to admit that I love to rejoice in my children's successes in sports and school, but those successes fail in comparison to the overwhelming sense of pride that I feel when I see my kids enjoying the little things in life.

 

• Helping a younger sibling read or write
• Following an ant trail down the sidewalk
• Trying a catch a butterfly
• Chasing a rabbit in the yard
• Catching a snake, lizard, or spider to examine it
• Playing a back yard game of kickball
• Setting up an obstacle course in the front yard 
• Running in the rain
• Jumping in puddles
• Splashing in a sprinkler
• Climbing a tree

Happily this list also goes on and on as my kids truly do enjoy the little things in life and are constant reminders to me that I need to do the same. There are several reasons for us to take joy in the simple things, but the most important reason for us to do this is that our kids are watching what we do. If they see us running around nonstop without ever stopping to enjoy the simple things, then they will end up doing the same. I, for one, am not looking forward to the day that my kids decide they are too busy to take times for the little things, for they will only have this time as kids once. Luckily, for those of us that choose to, we are able to revert back to the simplicity of childhood every once in a while by observing and interacting with the children in our lives. Remember, that it is when we appreciate the world at its least pretentious that we are happiest.