I've been a SAHM (that's Stay At Home Mom) for a good 3 weeks now. (By the way, does any one else think that is the stupidest term ever? I sense a venting post just on that alone in my future....) It's very interesting to see the other side of the coin, where the grass was supposed to be greener. Where rainbows and unicorns would dance and sing, and I would gleefully prance about the house in comfortable clothes merrily vacuuming, dusting, and folding clothes as the hours passed.
Well, let me tell you something....
IT'S EVERYTHING I COULD HAVE HOPED FOR!!!! Well, unicorns and rainbows are eluding me, but I've never been a big fan of either anyways, so I'm cool with that. Now, I'm not saying I've developed some new found love for cleaning, organizing, cooking (actually that has not improved one bit and Chris still helps out with that everyday. What a guy!) I don't enjoy doing the housework, it's just that it can happen a bit more at my own pace, and if I want to take a nap in the middle of matching a pile of socks roughly the same height as the bed, then that is okay.
One thing that has been very interesting, is the amount of FREE time we have each evening and on the weekends. It's ridiculous! With the cleaning and chores out of the way, or knowing that I can work on something during the day rather than having to rush to fit it in during the evening hours, we have an enormous amount of time to just...be. We can lay around and be vegetables, we can play outside -- hello 75 degrees (again, another future post) -- we can be together without the idea of projects and chores looming over us in guilt. It's not like there aren't projects to be done, there are plenty, it's just that there is time now.
We have even noticed that this has had a great impact on the kids. They watch less television on the weekends and during the week, and they are playing with their toys, playing on the trampoline, and playing together without having to be asked, or threatened. It's not like they're really getting along or showing great improvement in their behavior, but I guess everything is much more relaxed.
It can't stay this way forever, eventually I will be headed back to the world of the working mom. I am not sure when that will happen, it could be a month; it could be more, it could be less. So I savor each day, I savor the morning cartoons; I savor folding clothes while I watch the Today Show. I savor the laundry (gulp), the kitchen sink (ew, not really), and all of the other tasks and chores throughout the days. Though at times it feels like that is all. I. do. is. clean. I savor it. Because I know that it means when Big Belle gets home from school, and Chris gets home from work, we can be together and relax.
In the meantime, the laundry is ready to go in the dryer, Clara Belle is hungry, the dishwasher needs some relief, and because I didn't do any picking up this weekend, I have to do the great Monday morning pickup. Perhaps the unicorn can help....
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