A week in the life

I have started to miss the days when I had first gone PRN at my hospital, when I was DONE with the whole place and was barely barely barely agreeing to work every other Monday.  Rylan and I had lots of good times. We had just joined MOPS and that KRAZY playgroup that imploded on itself, but at first was really fun. We rocked the stay at home life.

Now our week looks like this:
Monday-I work/kids go to Tiny Town, the entire family has to be in the car by 6:30 for Rob and I to       get to work on time.
Tuesday-HIPPY (home based preschool) person comes to our house at 8:15 or (lately) we have to meet her at the local Elementary school to turn in our school work and get a new week.
Wednesday-Speech Therapy for Rylan at 8am at the local elementary school. MOPS activity after.
Thursday-Developmental Therapy for Rylan at 8am at the local elementary school.
Friday-I work/kids go to Tiny Town. The entire family has to be in the car by 6:30 for Rob and I to get to work on time.

Because I work only 16 hours a week, I feel like a Stay at Home Mom. Somehow, being a stay at home mom, two days a week I am out of the house by 6:30 and the other three days I am out of the house by 7:45am. Whaaaaaaat?

*a facebook friend once said that Stay at Home Moms sit around in their pajamas all day. One, these are workout clothes, get it right Judgy McJudgerson. Secondly, before 8:30 am today, I had served my kids a hot breakfast, taken my son to therapy, gone to the hardware store, done an At-home preschool lesson, and clipped coupons. BOOM SHAKKA LAKKA!!!!!

When I decided to quit being Fatty Fatterson, I didn't just embark on a diet and exercise plan. Jenny Craig or Weight Watchers or Jillian Michaels wouldn't have fixed ALL of the issues. That's why I tried in September and failed and tried again in November and failed. Taking care of two very busy boys, one that goes to 2 therapies and needs to practice what he learns in therapy, teaching my kid preschool at home, going to playdates, volunteering in MOPS, having kids that tend to have lots of illness, working part time, and trying to repaint and fix up our house was stressing me out. Everything was getting done half assed. I was eating for the quadruplets I was not pregnant with due to all that stress.

When I made my resolutions this year, something in me changed. I really wanted to be a better me. A better person, a better mom, a better wife.  Seriously. Sometimes you get so caught up trying to make everyone else happy and healthy you skip yourself.  So, I started getting up and working out either in the morning or during nap/quiet time. Then I really really really started counting my calories. Then I started making better choices for what I do with those calories, way more fruits and veggies. Way less cereal at 10pm. Then I started telling people "no" sometimes. Then I started making decisions that were better for me, my husband and my kids, not based on what others would think of those decisions.........

One of those decisions was working 2 days a week. Especially the Monday/Friday thing. It wasn't working out for my family. Rob cannot call in on Mondays and one of our kids gets sick on the weekend 50% of the time. The beauty of being a stay at home mom is getting to stay at home. And I wasn't doing that.

I started socking away my paycheck in savings to see if we could fly without needing it. We passed the test. No more Mondays. I am deathly afraid of losing my nursing skills, so I don't know if I'll every fully be able to stay home full time with the kids, so I am going to work one day (Friday) a week (and take a few of those off too!) for the time being. Mondays will be our practice therapy/Hippy/house catchup day. Oh happy Monday.

Happy Happy Monday. First on the list? We need Max to take one for the team. Diapers are expensive and Mommy isn't working much.That and the kid keeps taking his diaper off. Potty Training starts Monday.

And because a blog post isn't a blog post with no pics, here is a pic of the third boy in the family that won't smile at the camera along with the world most pathetic dog. We love her, but really? That's a little ridicu-donku-lous.