Comments (6)

By rebecca, January 13, 2011 2:51 pm

Mom guilt for me usually revolves around two things: diet and TV. I’ve gotten a lot better with the guilt thing as my kids have gotten older and I’ve clocked more years of motherhood. You start to realize that one McDonald’s lunch in front of the TV is pretty small potatoes in the long run. And that there is more to parenting than breastfeeding, I’m afraid. It’s not that simple.

Still, I’m not immune. Since Colum has started school, lunch has become a rushed and harried experience. We have to be at the school bus stop (a 5 – 10 minute walk with kids) at noon which means we should really be sitting down to eat lunch at 11am. Which means … we should be eating breakfast at what time? Earlier than we do, that’s for sure. I also try to do some work in the mornings while the kids play together (I said “try”), so I’m usually running up to get lunch on around 11 and then we sit down between 11:15 and 11:30 and then my kids proceed to go for the world record for longest time ever to eat a cheese sandwich and some veggie sticks. It’s crazy. Finally we finish eating and it’s off to the bathroom for precautionary pre-school pees. Added bonus: Irene’s toilet training now, so she needs to go, too! Then it’s the mayhem of trying to get two kids suited up for the winter, one of whom is two and therefore throwing a tantrum at the bottom of the stairs because I only let her turn the lights on and off three times. The other is a fairly co-operative four year old, but also the most distractable person on the face of the earth. So I wind up putting his snow suit on for him because we have to go even though he should be doing it himself by now.

This all amounts to an extremely stressful lunch and a mad dash to the school bus peppered with much yelling and tears. I told another mom at the bus stop that’s it’s just so hard to squeeze lunch in that early; how does she do it? Her answer: she doesn’t. “I stopped trying,” she said. Instead, they eat a big breakfast a little later, have a snack before school, and she packs a more substantial school snack. Ah.

There have been days when getting dressed took so long, we did brunch instead of lunch, but I worried it wasn’t enough. They don’t get much time to eat their snack at school and I worried Colum wouldn’t get through much more than the cereal bar or muffin I usually pack him. I worried that I needed to provide a typical meal structure even though it wasn’t working for us. I guilted myself into it.

So as of tomorrow we’re trying something new. It will be fresh fruit first thing in the morning and then a big brunch meal around 10:30. I’ll pack a standard snack and also have something ready to go for after school. That should keep them fed and take the edge off our mid-day rush. (I hope!)

Now I just need to wake up before them to get some work done.

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By rebecca, May 19, 2010 3:16 pm

DAILY SNACK

Here’s the thing we don’t talk about much:

Hygiene is tricky when you’re at home with young kids.

Sure, we talk about not having the time to take a shower,

And still being in your PJ’s at 3pm when you have a newborn,

But what about when you have an 18 month old?

For four years, I’ve been winging it, shower-wise.

My preference is to shower in the morning, upon waking.

That NEVER happens.

Between breakfast and getting dressed and shuffling off to our morning routines,

Or just dunking my head in a pot of coffee for a couple hours,

It’s hard to find the time.

The time I do have,

When the little one’s asleep or after bedtime,

Is invariably spent taking care of much more pressing matters that I simply cannot attend to with screaming kids running amok.

That shower will just have to wait a little bit longer,

Until it really can’t.

So, yesterday, I was determined to find a way to shower while Irene was still awake,

In our not-quite-finished and incredibly un-childsafe home.

I brought the bath toys down to the main floor bathroom,

(Because the upstairs tub is good for baths but not showers just yet)

And filled the sink with soapy water.

I closed the door and was able to keep an eye on her through the glass shower door,

While she stood on a step stool and played to her heart’s content.

Genius!

Why I haven’t thought of this before,

I’ll never know.

But, just in case you haven’t either,

There you go.

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By rebecca, March 4, 2010 4:25 am

DAILY SNACK

He’d been thrashing around on the bed for twenty minutes.

He was being silly,

Obstinate,

Unfocused.

I kept begging him to put his pajamas on.

“You can win another happy face sticker.”

Lame.

He was tired; I was tired.

I let go of Irene to pick out her pj’s,

Just as he reached over and grabbed her,

And she rolled over willingly,

Wrestling like they always do.

Except there was no bed on the other side of him,

And she went careening over him,

Head first.

I dove across the bed and caught her ankle,

Just as her head was hitting the floor.

And time froze for a couple beats,

As I dangled my daughter upside down off my bed.

Then I let her down gently and got up to comfort her.

She was hurt, but not badly.

Then,

I started screaming.

Thank goodness for doors that close and rooms to calm down in.

Thank goodness for teary-eyed hugs and I’m sorrys.

Because I know he didn’t mean to hurt her.

And he knows I didn’t mean to hurt him.

And I think we’re going to be alright.