One Day in the Life of a Stay-at-Home Mom

By some fluke of nature, we have acquired some new married friends that have no children yet. We are ecstatic for many reasons. A. They have a pool, B. bedtime for them depends on how early they have to get up the next morning and C. Everything my 2-year-old does is "soooooo cute" (including tantrums, large messes and weird eating habits). This couple just moved in 2 weeks ago and today is his first day working at the same company the hubby works at and she doesn't start her job for another 2 weeks.

Last night, we had dinner with them and went swimming for Memorial Day. I was semi-confused when she kept asking me, "So what do you and your son do all day?" I was confused because none of my other mommy friends ask that question. I guess it's just understood what a stay-at-home mom does. I couldn't really answer her question on the spot because I was so taken back (not to be confused with offended) that she was actually asking me this. But after much thought, I think I have come up with an answer that would suffice.

I think that what happens when you have a toddler is that everyday processes like getting dresses and eating breakfast take 5 times the amount of time that they normally would take. For example, taking a bath. We (meaning me and the babe who is usually working towards the opposite goal) have to first clean a path large enough through the rubble to get into the bathroom, then I carry the toddler, who is screaming over and over again "I don't wanna take a bath!" into the bathroom, I somehow manage to get all his clothing off and pry his legs from the sides of the tub so that he is semi-submerged in the water when he remembers that he quite enjoys the bathtub! So he plays while I take a break pausing to look into the mirror (I would not recommend this step very often, it's quite shocking). We wash the babe off and let the water out which is celebrated with more screams, "I don't wanna get out of the bathtub!" After all the water is drained and my son has laid spread-eagle in the tub until he can no longer take the cold anymore, I force him to get out and get into his towel. This is the end of the bathtub experience. He is not dressed yet because that is a whole other process that takes much more time and bribing.

I am convinced that if I only had to get myself up, dressed and fed I would return to being a normal person who could get more accomplished in one day than laundry, eating 3 meals and the dishes.

This post was written as part of this month's Blog Exchange where the prompt was to pick one of your best previously written posts. This entry comes from Kendra over at Dramatized Reality. She has a 3-year-old son and a 6-month-old daughter. When she’s not keeping busy with her children, she likes to play the piano, scrapbook, read and sew.

Nancy’s "Best of" post can be found today over at Dramatized Reality. Click here to check out the other posts this month, and to get more info on the blog exchange.