The Working Mom

Now that I am back to work things have been a little crazy around the house. I get out of work at 5:00pm and I have close to a 45minute commute so as soon as I walk in the door I’m scrambling to get dinner ready. Rebecca has to eat by 5:30/5:45pm at the latest or she is screaming. Aiden is looking for a snack because he is hungry. I have relearned that I need to plan my meals in advance and I take out what I need from the freezer the night before. Last night I forgot to take out something so it turned into pizza night.

Either way it’s a lot of work. Seth has been going to bed a little later to get some paperwork done since he picks the kids up from daycare if he doesn’t have a late call. I have to prep lunches at night again. Get my clothes ready the night before. The alarm goes off at 5:10am and I snooze until 5:30. That gives me enough time to get ready before getting Aiden up at 6:15 so that he can get a Mickey fix otherwise all hell breaks loose and a meltdown ensues because he wants to watch a Mickey episode. 6:45am we’re all dressed and heading out the door so I can drop both off at daycare and then head to work by 8am. I wish it was 8:30am. That would make things so much easier on me as far as timing goes. I could leave at 7am instead and maybe spend a little more time in the drop off phase. This past week though I have come to really relish the time after work with the kids like I did at my old job. There is only so much time that is left in the day before they go to bed and now that they don’t home until close to 6pm instead of around 5pm I don’t want to miss anything. That means extra cuddles with Rebecca while she is calming down before being put in her crib around 6:45pm. Last night Aiden and I built a pillow fort on the love seat and the night before we played with is matchbox cars. He didn’t ask to watch a Mickey show and it was really nice to get that one on one time with him.

This past week I have also had time to think about my time at home with the kids. I really enjoyed being home with them. Don’t get me wrong there were times that I wanted to rip my hair out, but that is par for the course. It was easier in the end. I could help Seth out more with going to the bank, shipping packages, and mailing invoices. The house was a lot cleaner. I was able to do the laundry, dishes and any other cleaning that needed to be done during the day. I could go grocery shopping. Now I have to figure out if I want to spend 1.5 hours at the grocery store on the weekends instead of playing with the kids or do I go after they have gone to bed and then I sacrifice my workout for the night and any other house cleaning that I was trying to get done. Seth and I have talked about it and while we could make it work on just his salary it does make it a lot easier to have the 2 incomes. We would not be able to do as many things as we would like. Next year we both have a few bills that will be paid off so maybe then we will re-evaluate the situation. Until then I’m going to have to settle with being a working mom and hopefully Rebecca decides to wait to do some of her milestones at home instead of daycare.