Category: motherhood

motherhood · perfectly imperfect

Always Justifiying

Lindsey P. Brackett4 Comments
Since I became a stay at home mom, I have developed a habit of feeling I have to justify all these things I do all day long so it makes sense to folks (like my husband) why I need to be home right now.

By the way, Joshua never asks me to justify.  He’s so grateful I’m keeping mental breakdowns to a minimum these days that he doesn’t care I’m about to radically rock his world by making a lot more meatless meals.  Well, he cares a little bit because he hates beans.  That’s why I’m going to ease him into it with this yummy sounding deliciousness with no meat added from one of my favorite blogs.

Potato Lasagna.  Shhh…don’t tell him it’s on next week’s menu.

Anyway, I’ve got many things I could be doing right now.  None of them earn me any money to contribute to the family finances, but some of them save us money.

Like I’ve been researching our upcoming Fall Family Getaway to the Shenandoah Valley.  We figure we won’t be vacationing any this summer, we’ve got vacation points to use or lose, and we can swing by and see Joshua’s brother and his wife for the first time in two years, so we’re going to be away over Thanksgiving.  Which is kind of fun.  It helps us recharge as a family and gears us up for lots of quality time with the rest of the fam over Christmas.  We’re staying at a resort near Charlottesville, so any tips would be great.  I really want to know if Williamsburg will be worth the 2+ hour drive with three kids or if we should wait until another trip.  When it’s warmer and we have 4 kids.  And how about Montpelier and Monticello?  I love history and it sounds great to me, but will the kids have fun or will they drive me crazy?  Tough call.  The loved Biltmore, but it was a really big house with a really fun farmyard.

Oh, that was supposed to be about how research saves us money.  It’s because now I know the locations of restaurants I have coupons for and where to find the Walmart so we can cook in the cabin.  See, now we’re not being impulsive.

And my potato lasagna blog also has this post about homemade laundry detergent.  I bought the ingredients, now I just need to make it.  But, I cleaned the kitchen this morning and after cooking all day yesterday and the day before that and the day before that…..I don’t feel like grating soap on my cheese grater today.

Homemade Laundry Soap

Maybe tomorrow I’ll save us money doing that.  For today, I think I’ll just fold the already clean laundry and plot how I can make leftovers enticing and work on another article to submit somewhere for publication.

Did I mention I’ve already had lunch at school with the girls, reorganized the pantry, filled an open childcare slot at jazzercise, looked at Christmas card possibilities, and put Amelia down for a (hopefully) long nap since she was up at 5:20?

See the justification?  How did I ever manage to do all that and work full-time?

motherhood · perfectly imperfect

Imperfectly Perfect Wishing

Lindsey P. Brackett2 Comments

Unfortunately I don’t want to even try to count the number of times in the past two weeks these words came out of my mouth or heart–I can’t wait for you to go back to school.

I know it’s not a crime to crave routine or to want a few uninterrupted moments during my day or to recognize that my eighteen-month apart strong-willed competitive daughters need a break from each other.  I know it’s not a crime to look forward to the start of school and new beginnings and fall with all it’s fresh crispness and possibilities.

But I’ve been wishing away my moments.  My time.  My precious seconds and minutes and hours of everyday when they’re still little enough to think I am perfect.  Perfect for them at least.  Moments I can never get back and reclaim and try again. 

So just a little bit today I’m wishing it was still summer.  And they were here quietly watching a movie so mommy can get some work done.

motherhood · reflections · school

What It All Means

Lindsey P. Brackett3 Comments

It’s my first official day as a stay-at-home mom and Amelia is screaming in her crib.  She’s of the opinion that her fifteen-minute catnap home from Wal-mart was good enough.

I am not.

And since I’m determined that this part of our day, the beautiful, (usually) quiet, naptime part is going to be my time of reflection and writing, I’m refusing to get her.  She’s really mad.  I think she can hear me typing.

So, I’m writing this to the music of her wails and the header from A Holy Experience because I need at least one calming influence.

Except I just caved and good thing.  The wail changed.  Moms know.  Now it’s not just an “I’m so mad I can’t stand myself” cry, but the one that makes you realize something might really be wrong.  Her leg was stuck in the crib bars.  So, I’ve rescued her and now she’s trying to make phone calls.  She’s really irresistible, this bundle of curls and sticky, tears still on her cheeks.

It’s our first day home alone since she was eight weeks old.  I’m not sure what to do with her.  Or myself.  The big girls are off to school, and while that prompted a whole different flood of emotions for so many different reasons, it is done.  They’re both at the school where Madelynne started kindergarten and sometimes they’ll hop that yellow bus over to my old stomping grounds and I’ll be there waiting just like last year.

Truthfully, the hardest part of back to school has been not going myself.  I feel awkward, out of place, a little disjointed.  But I tell people I’m fine.

I asked Joshua, “What if I gave up the only thing I’m really good at?”

To which he promptly reminded me of all my other gifts and dreams and the realities of what I’ve already committed to because obviously others don’t think that.

But the truth is I’m scared sometimes.  Of how we’ll make it.  Of what I’ll become.  Of who I want to be.

Teaching was my safety net.  I was secure.  I was liked (mostly).  I was comfortable.  Now when people ask me what I do, I always feel the need to justify myself.

“I taught at North until now.  Just taking some time off to be a mom.”  Like I have to apologize for wanting to do what’s best for our family, what’s best for me.

Because I couldn’t do it all and trying was killing me.

So what I mean is, I’m a mom.  And that’s okay.  But the person who became this mother, she’s still becoming more than just that.  And that’s okay, too.

Because now I have the time to try something new.  And I’m not fine.

I’m graced.

MOPS · motherhood · perfectly imperfect

My Done List

Lindsey P. Brackett3 Comments

A couple of weeks ago I was thrown in a church van and carted off to Nashville and suckered into being on the leadership team for my local MOPS group.  Really, that’s how it happened.

Or rather, my good friend ML knew exactly which of my gifts to appeal to when she asked me to consider taking a last minute opening on the Steering Team, and then she dangled the notion of FOUR DAYS in a fancy hotel in a faraway city WITHOUT my kids.

So, we all know I said yes.  And I learned a lot in those four days about myself, about my friends, about my mothering. Some of it I’m going to be sharing over the next few weeks as I begin to make peace with myself about who I am and who I want to be.  Some of it I’m saving for when I get my new blog up and running.

That’s right.  In a few weeks, Random Acts is going private and I’m going to try something new about this new life I’ve been given.  So, anyway, all that is to say that the speaker of my session on relieving our mommy stress suggested the very simple task of NOT creating to-do lists.

I don’t know about you, but I love lists.  The satisfaction of crossing something off is cheaper than a therapist and less caloric than a mocha frappe.  But she was right.  If I don’t cross everything off, I feel like a failure.  Hello, perfectionist pleaser in me that needs to be eradicated.  Or at least toned down.  Instead, she suggested that if we mothers need a list full of check marks to feel successful, why not create a list of that day’s accomplishments.  So simple.  So exactly what I need to remember some days.  So now you’ve read all my rambling so you can get to a list of why exactly I have been blog absent and blessedly busy the past week.

I’ve done….
packed suitcases and backpacks and picnics for family vacation
and this time I remembered the pack and play.
trekked my girls all over downtown Asheville and indulged them in cupcakes and suckers and paint your own pottery.
cried at the news story of Joplin, Missouri who despite the obstacles opened their schools on time for the 2011-2012 school year so that those students could experience normalcy.  And they took in every student no matter where they’ve been displaced to, because when you’ve lost your home or your parents or your routine, the last thing kids need is teachers who don’t remember their names.
learned to work the GPS on Joshua’s new Droid phone so we can join the 21st century.
taken over 200 pictures that no one but me probably cares to see but they make me smile.
cautioned the girls not to squeeze the baby chickens.
resisted the urge to refold all the dishtowels Belle folded for me.
fielded dozens of phone calls about our elementary school situation.
opted NOT to talk to the media about it.
thought about a dozen blog ideas.
picked a dozen roma tomatoes.  We actually grew something!
cleaned the bathroom within 30 minutes of arriving home because the toilet overflowed.
cleaned the house in anticipation of a showing that didn’t show.  
attended two MOPS steering team meetings and heading back tonight.
missed an important rehearsal but learned my lines for the first four pages.
visited my friends at North and confessed to myself that I miss those Bobcats.
I’ll stop now because that’s enough.  But isn’t it sad that we beat ourselves up over feeling like we’ve done nothing all day when in reality we’ve done so much to make the world a better place for us and for those little ones whose eyes are already on us?
MOPS · motherhood

The Twirlwind

Lindsey P. Brackett2 Comments

Lately life does feel like I’ve been on one of those twirly rides that make you a little sick but you get on anyway and laugh your way through it.

In the past seven days I’ve been to three states, slept on the ground and at the Opryland Hotel, eaten M&Ms at two a.m., line danced in downtown Nashville, swam in a waterfall, and bared (a bit) of my soul.

It’s been great, but I think I’d like to get off now.  I’m tired.  But that’s probably because I took the girls to the water park today and still have receipts to put in the checkbook, dinner to heat (yay leftovers!), and lines to study before rehearsal.

Rehearsal?

Yeah, I thought I wasn’t busy enough since I’m full-time staying home so I auditioned for The Diary of Anne Frank at the community theater.  I’ll be Mrs. Frank.  Hospitable Jewish housewife who struggles to understand her second daughter.  Sounds just like me.  Minus the Jewish part.  And I’m working on hospitable, as in, I’ll let you in, just don’t look in my laundry room or sink.  And beverages are sometimes limited to apple juice and pink Sunny D.

So this is on top of being the publicity coordinator for my MOPS group, which is why I spent four awesome days in Nashville learning how to be a better mommy.  That’s the story I gave my girls for why I was gone.  They don’t think it worked since I came home and promptly broke all ten “mom stress reliever” tips I learned in a seminar with the incredible Jill Savage.  I did, however, write down all the great ways she said to learn to say “no” and I’m going to start using them.  Except…I’ve already committed myself to MOPS and youth Sunday School, but I’m going to try this whole “just say no” thing next time somebody asks for something.

Really.  I am.

‘Cause this mom’s cup is already full and about to spin out of control.

If you’re interested check back later this week for more on the MOPS 2011 conference and how you can join my group or start your own.  If you’re not interested in that, just come back for some more stories about my chaotic random life.