Why Pinterest Makes Me a Bad Mom

I don't know about you, but sometimes I worry I don't measure up as a mom.  ESPECIALLY because I'm an old mom.  I'm 51 (and a half), and I am the parent of twin 4 year olds.  My "peers" in the parenting world are half my age with beautiful skin, great bodies, and the energy of . . . well . . . a 20 something!

While they are worrying about getting Bobby into a great college (even though he's only 3),  I'm working on being healthy and alive when my kids get to college!

On the flip side, I've parented kids through every stage of life, from infancy to adulthood.  I've survived the terrible twos and potty training, bad grades and bullies, teenage attitudes, driving, dating, drinking, and broken hearts (and not necessarily in that order).

I'm pretty chill about the fact that one of my four year olds still wets the bed.  I'm okay that they don't know how to read, or add 2+2.  I'm fine with the notion that they might not read until kindergarten or dare I say it . . . first grade.  And it's okay that they may or may not be in the "gifted" class at school.  When it comes to rearing children, I've learned to take life at the pace it comes.

I'm Chill.

That is.

Until.

I get on Pinterest.

And then I am overcome with the need to create, recycle, upcycle, do, glue, paint, design, decorate, make and bake all for the sake of "making memories" with my children. And when I'm done with all of that, I need to dream, surprise, inspire, delight, protect, teach, date, nurture, discipline, and feed them!

I tell you, I thought I had it all together, until I got on Pinterest.  As it turns out, I am a slug for a mom.  I don't know how to cook.  I'll never have buns of steel.  I can't convince my husband to date his daughters (heck, I can't convince him to date his WIFE!) and I don't know how to make a damn darn thing from an old pallet.

All that to say, I guess I'll just have to stick with what I know; teach them what they need to know, when they need to know it, fill our home with laughter (mostly), and love them unconditionally for their lifetime.

Finding the Margins

When I was in college, I had this one professor who always allowed us to use a cheat sheet on test days. That policy, in and of itself, was not that unusual, as many professors had similar policies.  But where this professor differed was that he had no rules about our cheat sheet other than it all had to fit on the front side of one sheet of paper.

No rules about font size.

No rules about margins.

Simply, "However many words you can get on the front side of one piece of paper."

Like everyone else, I tried to type my entire study sheet on that piece of paper.  Every. Single. Word. I used size 6 font and set the margins as wide as I could.  And in whatever white space was left by my printer's inability to print that wide, I wrote by hand.  There was not one square inch of white space.  No discernible margin.

I noticed, though, that this didn't actually help me on test days.  There was too much on the page to be useful at all.  I couldn't find any of the information I needed because the words were all just crammed together on the page.

So I changed my strategy and actually studied for the test.  Then I put information on the sheet that I thought I might need during the test.  Around each piece of this information was space.  Lots and lots of space.  And because I had created margins around my information, it was easy to find what I was looking for.

I was thinking about this yesterday because I listened to a sermon from Andy Stanley called Breathing Room,  and it made me realize that sometimes too much is just too much.  Cramming everything into life that you think you need doesn't make your life better, it makes it busy.  And it makes it infinitely harder to find the things in your life that are actually beneficial.

All that to say, I'm going to begin today to find the margins of my life, create some white space, and enjoy the breathing room.

Sometimes, a Girl Just Needs Her Mommy

Mike started his new job this week.  For those of you not in the loop, Mike sold his company, and went to work for a very large corporation.  I can never remember his title, and every time I say it, I get it wrong, but as best as I understand it, he oversees crews of people who run pest control routes.

Some of his crews work days, some nights, and some weekends.  And for now, as he is getting to know his crews, their routes, see what they do and where they do it; he works some days, some nights, and some weekends.

THAT means a significant amount of transition in our household.  But change is good, right?

You have to keep in mind that for over 2.5 years, we have had a pretty consistent routine in our lives with the girls.  We have nicely divided certain duties as it relates to their care.

For example, in the mornings I get the girls lotioned, dressed and do their hair.  Then Mike feeds them breakfast and brushes their teeth.  At bedtime, Mike bathes them then I rock them to sleep.  If the girls wake up at night, Mike gets up with them.  Once they wake up for good in the morning, I get up with them, and he sleeps in.  Like I said, we have duties.


But for the time being, as Mike is trying to figure out his new schedule, many of these duties will fall to me.  I don't mind doing them, of course!  It's just that it's different.  But change is good, right?

As I was rocking the girls to sleep tonight, I had a couple of thoughts.  One was how grateful I am that my mom is here right now because she is so much help.  She's learned the lotioning and hair routine.  She cleans the kitchen (I HATE to clean the kitchen).  And she is here in the middle of the night.  When Mike isn't home, I don't sleep well, but knowing someone else is in the house with me helps me sleep at night.

And I also thought, what is this going to be like when I'm all by myself?  It's not that Mike is never going to be home, it's just that his "at home" time isn't going to coordinate very well with mornings, bedtimes, bath times, etc.  And there's TWO of them.

But I'm a grown woman.  I can handle this!  I've already raised two kids! Right!  Right? right?

All that to say, change is good.  It's just very unnerving sometimes.  I'm sure glad I've got my mommy. :) At least for a couple more weeks.

All That to Say: Life in the Ville

I remember when the boys were little, and I had quit my job to be a stay at home mom, that I had this insatiable need to be "productive."  I went from being a corporate executive to staying at home with toddlers.  Man, what a career shift!

Never in my wildest imagination would I have dreamed that I'd be at home again, raising toddlers.  But I'm so grateful to have this opportunity and this time to be at home with them.  I have, however, realized that my insatiable need to be "productive" is still present.  Sadly, my need to be productivie is limited to creative things and not "necessary" things like housekeeping or laundry! 

Anyway, this week, I wanted to do something fun with the girls that they could make and give to their teachers.  I searched Pinterest for hours, well, technically I got on Pinterest to find a cute project and was distracted by all the crockpot recipes I'll never cook, cupcakes recipes I shouldn't cook, cute outfits I could never wear, and workout regimens I will never attempt.  But then, SUDDENLY, I found a cute little fall trail mix recipe and decided that would be our project.

I assembled the ingredients:  (I'd like to begin with a warning that this is not a healthy snack. It's filled with things that came out of boxes and is likely to contain all sorts of deadly toxins like high fructose corn syrup and maybe even monosodium glutamate.)

1 Family Size box of Honey Nut Cheerios
2 Large bags of Mini Pretzels
1 Regular size box of Reeses Cereal
1 Large container of honey roasted peanuts
1 Large box of Cheez-Its
1 Large (party size) bag of Reeses Pieces (you could use M&M's)
1 Large box of raisins
1 Regular size bag of candy corn (mostly for color)

Then we dumped them all in a giant size boiling pot.  (Note:  You will not actually boil or cook this, it just makes A LOT and requires something very large to mix it in.)   In hindsight, I would have mixed it in a garbage bag (new, of course) because that's what I ended up doing in the end!  Again, this makes A LOT!

The girls particularly enjoyed this part as they could open the boxes and dump the ingredients in!

Then we used an ice scoop to scoop the ingredients into clear plastic party bags (available at Wal-Mart on the party aisle, 20 for $1.49) and tied them up with cute orange curling ribbon and a sweet "Happy Halloween" printable that I got here.  By the way, curling ribbon is so cheap, available at all party stores, and is great to have on hand in many colors!  I have a big box of spools of ribbon, so I'm pretty much set for most projects.

The girls discovered that if they spilled some on the floor, they could "pretend" to go throw them away and eat them on the way.  It took me a few minutes to discover their little trick!

Anyway, here is our finished project. 

You could still make these and use these printables instead. 

And of course, you could make a healthy version too.  Maybe my friend Meagan Peters will create one for you all!  If she does, I'll let you know!

All that to say, life here in the Ville, "Toddlerville" is fun some days (most days).


I love being a mom.  I am working on my need to be busy all the time, but at least other people benefit from my "productivity!"