Life Lessons from the Motherhood

   Lesson One: Eating your Mother's Day Breakfast

        Okay, lets face it. Breakfast in bed is an awesome gesture, even though you have to spend half an hour shaking the sheets of breadcrumbs afterwards. But if your child is under the age of teenage than you're not getting a gourmet meal. My last meal consisted of a piece of toast piled high with the contents of my fridge on it. Apples, cut with a butter knife. Strawberries, a little bit on the mushy side because they washed those suckers good. And peanut butter, jelly, honey, cinnamon. I'm probably lucky there wasn't ketchup on top.
       They, the small children that allow you to celebrate this holiday called Mother's Day, wake you up after allowing you an extra five minutes of sleep and hand you this plate of food. Then they anxiously wait for you to eat it. Their little faces all grins and smiles and joy.
       And how can you not eat it?
       Simple trick #1:  Nibble on what looks safe to consume. Just don't spit it out when they calmly tell you it's the part that fell on the floor and the dog licked it but they washed it off.
        Simple trick #2: After eating a few bites, keep them talking. Thank them for the lovely gesture, because heck, these little people adore you, take a moment to savor it. But keep them talking. Eventually, they will run off to play and you can safety dispose of the rest of your meal without hurting their feelings.

    Lesson Two: Enjoy your Day of Leisure

         Ahh, wouldn't it be nice to sit back on this holiday, put our feet up and read a book without interruption? I vaguely recall those days. I remember the Mother's Day a couple of weeks before Bean was born, I was huge. Imagine the marshmallow monster on Ghostbusters, yeah, that could have been me.
         My ankles were swollen like balloons, my face was rounded with too much of Ben and Jerry's ice cream (think sixty or seventy pounds of pregnancy weight) and I was experiencing that feeling of being done. I'm ready for my baby, can I have my body back now?
      Hero Hottie took me out to breakfast that morning and the waitress gave me a free dessert, a strawberry shortcake, for Mother's Day. Suddenly, I had been given admittance to this special holiday. Yes, a holiday where I get pampered, and I don't have to do anything.
     Ahh, it was a lovely day dream. Because once you have kids, you realize that there are no more days off for you....EVER. A weekend? What's that? It's just a day that's a bit quieter than the week...MAYBE. But suddenly you're responsible for at least three meals a day...SEVEN DAYS a week. Laundry? You want to take a break from laundry? Not a good idea. Laundry starts to develop into a life form of it's own if left more than a day or two.
    And changing diapers. Yep, those happen on Mother's Day too. Even the really smelly poopy ones that take an hour of clean up time for you and the Baby.
      And when the kids grow old enough to volunteer to take over the chores, so you don't have to do anything. Well, lets just say their standards aren't quite at the same level as yours.
     
    Simple Trick #1: Enjoy the day anyway. You're a Mother and it's awesome to have a day when your children give you cards that are simply decorated with their hand prints. I know, you see plenty of those on the walls and the windows everyday. But when you're older and your Bean is turning into a young woman, than looking back at those tiny hand prints...well, it causes your heart to burst with all sort of emotion.

    Simple Trick #2: Clean the house the day before, plan easy meals, and do something fun with your kids. And if they promise you an uninterrupted bubble bath...DON'T believe them. That just means they hold off for ten minutes instead of five before they're pounding on the door and asking you if you're enjoying your uninterrupted bubble bath.


Lesson Three: Appreciation

    Ahh, it's that moment when you realize, as your four year old and your two year old, hand you a bouquet of dandelions from the yard, with grubby, chubby little fingers and grins that are the sweetness expressions you have ever seen...that being a MOTHER is AWESOME!

    There isn't a job, or a talk, or a book that can prepare you for this task of raising another human being. There should be something though.
    A book that warns you of the effects of sleepless nights because Baby Blueberry is teething. Think sleepwalking at this point.
    A talk given on how to balance the needs of more than one kid. Because one size does not fit all. And once you realize that sayings applies to everything, from the way you discipline, to the way you help with homework, to the activities that they like to do, life will be so much easier.
   Now LOVE, that should be the same. Kiss them and hug them and love them in the same amounts, even when you have a Bean. Who likes to test boundaries and the word NO. OVER AND OVER AGAIN. Because at the end of the day, she still needs a hug and a kiss and a reassurance that no matter what you still love her.

Simple Trick #1: Sometimes a day can be overwhelming. The worst moments of parenting for me were the potty training moments. I didn't do well with potty training. And I'm not even sure why. A lack of patience on my part, hating the power struggles that can occur, frustration over accidents in public places. But I know I don't do well with this task...so with Baby Blueberry I'm going to step back and not worry so much. Obviously, your kid eventually moves from diapers to using the toilet....and then they have entered big kid territory and they have grown that much more.
        So I can't say I will enjoy potty training any more this time than with Bean and Abu, but I won't allow it to frustrate me so bad that I miss all the other great things going on during that stage of development.
     Don't concentrate on the crappy moments in parenting, you'll miss the good stuff.

Simple Trick #2: Appreciate the woman in your life that mothered you. Sometimes this isn't your biological mom but someone that fulfilled that role.
    Now, you can understand why they were always cleaning (think YOU) and why they drank four cups of coffee in the morning (think YOU again) and why you never ask them "What's for dinner and when it is?" unless you were ready to see steam coming from their ears. Now, I understand why. After three meals a day, seven days a week...the question gets old.
    "Food.  You get FOOD. What else do you think I would be feeding you? And if you tell me that the new chicken dish was not food, than you're grounded."

     This week I couldn't decide on a gift for my Mom. So I spoiled her with a week of Mother's Day. The first day was a bouquet of flowers (not dandelions), second day was a caramel roll, third day was candy bars, fourth day was potted plants, today will be a small, cute garden ornament, and tomorrow will be a picture of the grandchildren. Nothing fancy, but just small tokens of appreciation.

    So this motherhood thing isn't easy. It's causes sleep deprivation, loss of patience, bouts of meltdowns that aren't from the kids, boredom from doing endless loads of laundry and cooking thousands of meals, and feelings of inadequacy. 
    But I tell you what....every card with their handprint on it or simple poem written in it, every baby grin, every dandelion bouquet, and every Mother's Day breakfast, is the BEST.
   Every new development, from their first crawls to their first dances, is a reason to celebrate.
   My children bring me endless joy and so tomorrow when they bring me breakfast in bed (I cheated a bit, I bought cinnamon rolls for them to serve) and they hug me and give me their gifts, which are usually handmade and oh, so precious. I will be giving thanks in my heart.
    
   Happy Mother's Day!!!

McDegrees...Can I Supersize It?

       If I was living in the UK I suppose I can make my Mum proud and earn a degree...from McDonald's. Yes, I'm seriously talking about that fast food joint that sells a ton of food to children because it comes with a toy. When I was a child I didn't want a Happy Meal because of the burger, it was the toy. Why couldn't all meals come with a toy?
       'Mom, I'll eat my mixed veggies if I can get a toy.'
       Yeah, that never worked and that's why mixed veggies (a horrible combo of peas, carrots, lima beans and corn) always ended up in weird and unusual places. Such as below the rim of my plate, in napkins and in the bottom of milk glasses. If the dog managed to hide under the kitchen table, he was rewarded for his cleverness with mixed veggies, not the chicken he was hoping. (Grin)
      I'm not a big fan of McDonald's. My children have food allergies and can not consume most of their products and after a while of cooking food from scratch because of the aforementioned food allergies, McDonald's food just doesn't taste that great.
     But the toys can still be pretty tempting, especially for adults...I mean children.

     Toys and food aside, who actually wants a business degree from McDonald's? Are there teenagers working at the drive thru and deciding to working at McDonald's forever? Do they want and dream about  obtaining a degree that I would doubt is transferable into other college programs? If I'm wrong, then someone correct me but colleges are ridiculously picky about accepting credits from other schools, do you think a private university is going to look at a business degree from McDonald's and put them right into the fast track of obtaining their MBA. Of course, with how horrible Europe's and America's financial situations are right now, perhaps those MBA's in charge of our countries and large companies do have degrees from McDonald's. On the other hand, as far as I understand from a financial point of view, McDonald's isn't doing too bad, so perhaps the MBA's should have obtained their business degrees from the fast food giant, rather than from books and professors teaching them that to pay your debt you just borrow more money. Mmmm, I tried that once, it didn't work out well.
       Still, I have a hard time wrapping my head around the idea of my child growing up and deciding that she wants to work at McDonald's forever.
       I can hear the commercials now to convince parents of this opportunity. It would be like the armed forces commercials. (Disclaimer, I'm not making fun of the Armed Forces and our troops, just silly commercials.)

      'Mom, I thought long and hard about this and I really need you to understand.' Daughter says, while we're in the kitchen together. The music builds up, I have a look of doubt and worry on my face.
      'I want you to do what makes you happy Daughter, but are you sure this is what you want to do. This is a big decision and then I have to convince your Father.' I wring my hands together.
      "I want to be part of something bigger than me. I want to be part of something I can be proud of. I want you to be proud of me.' She is earnest, full of sincerity and obviously not a real teenager since she's not crying, yelling or slamming doors.
      I take a deep breath. 'I know. But are you sure you want to join...McDonald's?'
     Then the narrator comes on, convincing all parents that a degree from McDonald's in the best thing for their children and besides it comes with a Happy Meal.


       I had siblings that worked fast food, they left as soon as possible. The smell of stale fry oil that clings to everything; your clothes, your shoes, in your car; is not pleasant. The long hours, the cranky customers, the lazy workers, was never a career goal for them. So I supposed to believe that people are eager to obtain a business degree from a fast food company? Perhaps I'm wrong, a career at McDonald's might be a great opportunity in this poor economy and that's probably why the idea of a McDegree is bothering me. I could never see my free spirited children slaving away as a manager in a company that tries to convince everyone that it's a great and wonderful thing because they handed you a degree to do it.
      Call me hopeful, but as a mother I only want big and bright things for my children and working fast food, with or without a degree, isn't something that they will find happiness in.
      Even if it comes with a toy.