Mean Mommy

Why do men never use a plate, leave crumbs on the dish cloth, leave their shoes all over the house, leave toenails on the couch, wear the same smelly T-shirt for 5 days and then get cut when asked to clean up after themselves?
Oh and worst of all, have the uncanny ability to sleep through the babies crying in the middle of the night! How? It is like someone is clanging a bell next to my head when she starts up at 2am! I shake my head and ask again, HOW?

My hubby is great at helping around the house and I still come up with all these faults. He does the dishes, baths the kids, works the garden and does his own laundry most weeks.
When I tell people this they all say "wow he is fantastic, you are so lucky". And I am. But why do I nit pick all the time, the poor bloke can't catch a break some days. Even though he does all these things (and works a full time demanding job) he doesn't do them to my standard. So I feel I have to go over everything and do it properly, complaining the whole time, which of course he pretends not to hear.

Do I need to relax the reins a bit and be grateful that he helps out at all? As some husbands don't do anything. A sad fact which of course I disagree with. A marriage should be a partnership, 50-50. Just because a man works does not make him exempt from housework. If a man or woman lives in a house then they are responsible for the maintenance and cleaning of that house.
Housework is NOT a womans job and I will argue until I am blue in the face with any man who disagrees with me.

Hubby and I spoke alot before we moved in together about what each other expects from a marriage/defacto relationship and thankfully we both wanted similar things. I suspect that he would have preferred to come home and be waited on like when he lived at home with his family, but I flat out refused to mother him.
This ties into my post the other day about easing up the high standards I set on myself and my household, I need to let go and relax a bit more. I know that in 20 years when we don't have the kids to talk about and fill up our time he may wake up and realise how controlling I am and say "Enough!"

So yes, I do need to relax the reins a little bit, be thankful for the extra work he does do to help me out. I need to remind myself he is at work all day, usually working through lunch and coming home late to provide the comfortable lifestyle we live in. I appreciate all he does, I truly do. But it would be nice to be appreciated for all I do as well. As any mother out there knows, it can be damn hard work.
And I seem to be making it harder for myself.

"I am mean mommy, and nobody wants to F#$% mean mommy"

(if anyone reads this knows where I quoted this from, let me know)

Time Management

What a couple of weeks we have had! I am mentally drained. I have organised two parties. One a baby shower which went quite well if I say so, the other a birthday party for my dear hubby who turned 35. It was a farewell of sorts, to our home here as well. We let our hair down and opened up the liquor cabinet. It was fun. Although we always pay for our fun the next day, ouch! On top of all that we have been negotiating our new home as well. I only get 1 1/2 hours a day when the kids are napping to sit at the computer and gather information. It's hard to tell what is accurate information out there on the net, so I always take everything with a grain of salt. ( what does that mean exactly?)
I haven't even had time to sit and do my cleanse this week, I am disappointed in myself for being slack about it. It is a peeve of mine that I say to myself "tomorrow I start eating good, or exercising more or get back into my meditation......" and I don't come through for myself.
That is definitely something I need to work on, lol, tomorrow I will finish what I start. LOL!
I think I will take the phone of the hook, turn off the mobile (ah heaven forbid) and sit down, take 5 Min's to meditate and 20Min's to write. No interruptions. Lets see if that works?

I realise I am the one that fills up my day with "things to do". Honestly is it really that important to check Facebook 8 times a day? Or vacuum the floor everyday? Or go to the shops for some grocery item I don't really need? Wouldn't it be more important to actually sit down and make activity time with the kids? I don't do that anymore, for some reason I have found more "important" things to do with my time than educate and play with my children. How sad. I mean we do have play time but it isn't for long, usually 10 Min's here and there, but nothing really substantial.
If I can't make time for myself once a day and I am not making time for my kids at least once a day, what on earth am I doing? What is taking up 15 hours of everyday?

As I read this back to myself I am determined now to draw up a timetable for my week and look at how I am honestly managing my time, and what room there is for much needed improvement. Its sounds like I am managing myself like I used to when I worked full time, but I feel that that is the best way for me to function. To have a list, a routine, to check back on now and then to make sure I am on track and I am not filling my days back up with menial tasks and time wasting habits.

If I continue to Blog consistently this week you will know I am back on track!

Busy Busy Busy Bee

My goodness what a week! One by one my family members all came down with the flu. Worst of all was my son and husband. They went down like a tone of bricks. It is so true that men just cannot handle being sick. Even poor little monster boy, he and hubby fed off each others misery. I wasn't allowed to get sick, then who would run the house? Luckily enough I didn't get it too bad, I powered through. This week has been a brain drain too, our little family plan we are working on (which I am still not allowed to talk about on the Internet) is well under way, and I have no idea where to start. I have been Googling my head off all week and getting nowhere fast. I am on a emotional roller coaster, during the day I am up up up, but come nightfall I start having all these doubts and by bedtime my mind is in overdrive and I cannot sleep thinking of all the 'what ifs'.
To top it all off I have been planning my hubby's 35Th bday party for this weekend, now I understand why every year we put it off, it just falls on such a busy month.
But today I am on fire, been grocery shopping with the kids which was amazingly successful. Baked 3 cakes, ordered food for party, cleaned house, decorate and then get ready to go to work tonight. All the while with my favourite Sex and the City shows on in the background. I am on a mission to make this party stress and work free so I can sit down, have a drink and enjoy our last party in this house.
As for my consciousness cleanse, well that will have to start again next week. How funny that I cannot seem to find 5 Min's in my day to meditate........

I am Ok.

I didn't blog over the weekend, too busy to sit down for 5 mins. I also didn't do any of my consciousness cleanse exercises. I am a little put off writing today, 2 reasons. My whole family has been hit with the flu and are miserable and I keep getting calls from my friends who have read my blog asking me if I am OK? They seem to think I am going mad or getting depressed or something. This is purely an outlet for me to basically exhale. I have kept a journal for years and no one will ever read it unless I either force them or I die and someone reads it out of curiosity. (no don't stress guys I don't want to die). I appreciate the concern, really but I am Ok. I would be more concerned if I stopped expressing myself, then you will know something is wrong.
So, what is the point of keeping it all locked up in my side drawer, I may as well keep it locked up inside me, so it can all pour out when I turn 50 and hit a mid life crisis. LOL.
I have always liked writing but never found a topic. So what better topic than ME. I like me, I plan to live an interesting and exciting life so why not write about it. My family are going to be going through some very interesting and exciting changes soon which I cannot write about until it is all formalised, but I am so excited I am ready to burst. I am dying to start planning and organising. I just cannot wait to start our adventure. So if anyone is following me, stay tuned because its about to get interesting.

Now back to my exercises, I will be back on track tomorrow when hubby is back at work and hopefully we are all feeling better. x

The gift of release?

The Gift of Release??
That is my exercise for today. To take the time to look at what has been stopping me from going after my dreams and desires. The obvious answer to that would be "I got married and had kids and that's my life and job" the response to that is "that's no excuse". That is true, it isn't an excuse but it is a big factor in why my life slowed down to a virtual stop.
I had a big struggle when I stopped work to be a stay at home mum with the fact that I had to rely on my husband for money. We argued constantly. He couldn't understand, he would always say "but babe this is your money too". But its not the same. When you have been as independent as I have for so long and worked so hard in minimum paying jobs its hard to just walk away. It has only been recently that we rearranged our budget that we came to more of an understanding.
Mind you we had some nasty arguments over it, some of the worst we have had.

But its that 'release' of control that I had a real problem with. So instead of controlling the money, i started to control everyone around me, right down to the family dogs. As our first baby was a terrible sleeper my poor hubby couldn't even pee in the toilet in the morning or brush his teeth in the bathroom in case he woke the baby, he had to go outside. Even in the middle of winter.
It wasn't until our second baby that I realised it was so silly to tiptoe around the house, avoiding the creaky floor boards and never flushing the toilet if the baby was down for his nap. Wow just typing this I am shaking my head.
My other controlling habits were (and possibly still are) that hubby or any other family members couldn't look after the kids as good as I could, I didn't even trust hubby to watch out for them if he wanted to take them to the park. I was like a nagging old goat, constantly reminding him to watch out for, my goodness, EVERYTHING! Wrap them in bubble wrap.
I even started to research getting an electric shock collar for my dog to stop him barking. How cruel. Thank heavens I didn't go there.

I realised that at the root of all this controlling lies a fear of something bad happening to my loved ones, especially the kids. I even used to have trouble sleeping as my mind would start imagining terrible things and I would toss and turn in frustration, silently wondering if I was going mad.
I cant even watch those criminal shows as they will usually trigger bad dreams.
Today's exercise is to be the gift of release, but how can I release if I am in fear of it?
My grip on everything is so tight, what happens if I let go?

Life goes on, I cannot control everything. I cannot control the bad drivers, or drunk drivers or the weather. If something bad happens, it happens. I just have to take care of my family in every possible way, as well as take care of myself and live our lives fully and freely and trust in God or whoever he/she is that they are watching out for us.

I need to stop existing and start living.

Self Awareness

Day 2 of my consciousness cleanse. The gift of self awareness. My exercise was to take time to look back at my life like I was watching a movie. Its a kind of meditation. Don't laugh.

So I looked back at my life (so far, I am only 29 after all) and felt a few emotions that surprised me. Mostly I felt disappointed at certain choices I had made when I was younger and funny enough they all had to do with men! Why can't we be born with hindsight?

When my first serious boyfriend from high school broke my heart, I went into a yucky spiral. I moved out of home ( for some reason I had to get out of there) at the far too young age of 17, hit the town too early, met the wrong guys, one of whom I became obsessed with ( and believed he felt the same for me) and led me to make the huge decision at 19 to pack my 2 suitcases, buy a bus ticket and move to Melbourne with nothing but a doona and pillow. I realised I thought I was making that choice to build a life and future with my boyfriend. His family was here and he was returning from the Army. I couldn't get here fast enough. Not realising at the time that I was breaking my families heart and leaving a lot of great friends who I would ultimately lose contact with (of course until Facebook was discovered). Upon arriving things went down hill fast, can you believe it? I was overwhelmed and lonely.
It wasn't until I met a lovely girl who took me out dancing and showed me how many gorgeous, great men there were that I opened my eyes to my relationship and saw it for what it really was - puppy love gone way wrong.
I knew I had to get out but having no money, 1 friend, no family and being way too stubborn to admit defeat and move back to Townsville I was stuck. Of course it all came to a head one very early morning after one very late night on the town that I was literally kicked out of our apartment and ended up staying with my 1 friend and her mum.
This friendship was meant to happen I am sure, as it was through this girl that over time I got back on my feet, met my now husband and had my beautiful babies.
This story took place over the course of 10 years and is still being written, but unfortunately that 1 friend I had is no longer in my life and it saddens me greatly, but its her choice and funny enough I do understand.

So back to those emotions, they conflict with each other of course. Pride at how I had the Courage to make the move, Disappointment with how I let certain men dictate my life and how when my relationships failed it seemed like my life was failing as well. I wish I had of been stronger. Pride at how I had the strength to stick it out in a strange, big city with no friends and virtually no money. Disappointed at not following dreams I had in school to travel the world and go to University. It seemed that my fickle relationships overshadowed my inner most dreams and desires to the point that those dreams disappeared.
Sheer happiness on my wedding day and indescribable emotions on the birth of my children (and amazement I survived the pain). And Curiosity as to what the future holds for me? Travel? YES. It is definitely not too late to full fill those dreams.

Does everything happen for a reason? Is it destiny? Or is it fate?

My first day at Blogging

Where do I begin?


I started my day out today waking up cranky and feeling run over with a head cold. My 8 month old daughter had me up from 2am crying, refusing to go back to sleep.

In the end I had to give in and give her a bottle of milk, which I don't like doing as I feel it teaches her to use the bottle to re settle rather than learning on her own. Then to my frustration she still wouldn't settle longer than 15Min's. Arggghhhh!

It is hard to think rationally at 3am hoping to God that her crying wont wake my 2 and a half year old in the room opposite.
Thankfully he sleeps pretty deeply.
Then to top off my wonderful night my early riser of a son came in at 5.30am already up and dressed looking for his slippers. I couldn't handle this one, I elbowed hubby to take him back to bed.

So why today of all days to start my own Blog? Frustration, a need for an outlet, who knows.

Mostly I have decided that I am at a turning point. I am so bogged down in babies routines, creche, swim classes, cooking, cleaning, etc. etc. Than I have lost ME. Hubby would roll his eyes at this but I believe other mums out there with small children would sympathise.

I also began my 21 day consciousness cleanse by Betty Ford I found on the Oprah website. I spent 8 mins while my baby slept and my son watched a cartoon to meditate and begin my journey to find my innermost desires. ( as I type this my baby just bonked her head and is screaming and my son is eating lunch making a huge mess, dogs barking, I need a bigger outlet!) excuse me a moment............so obviously that didn't go so well, I will try again tomorrow morning. But I did get to figure out what I desire; To get healthy and lose this baby weight.

So my affirmation for today is : I am worthy of living my hearts desires!

My outer action: eat more fruit, lay off the chocolate left over from Easter and drink more water.

My inner action: control my temper and frustration, take deep breaths and stay calm.

So far I have had chocolate already, lost my temper twice and had no water at all. Doing well I would say. lol.

This will be my daily outlet to express my frustrations, joys, thoughts, beliefs, mistakes, dreams and goals. And hopefully it will make some sort of sense.

So I begin with my 21 day consciousness cleanse as my start to making my life feel not busier but fuller and start to learn to appreciate what I have in life.


But to be honest, today isn't going so well. But it's a start and I will persevere.