"It's been a long time since you've last posted," my husband says as we watch Sunday night football and he picks at a paper/plays on the computer.
Hold on, let me adjust this baby in my arms in order to stop typing with one finger.
When people say that no two children are the same, I couldn't agree more.
So here's my life lately, thus my reasons behind non-posts... day by day. Some days are crazy - like CRAZY - and some days are rest from crazy. And some days and moments are a good mix. But thus is the life of a mom of 2.5 kids (I have an honorary member for 6.5hrs/workday). Please, let me explain a minute...
Rachael is almost 2. No more explanation needed. And Abi wants held - 24/7. And at any given moment in time someone is either fussing or crying or making a nasty diaper or needing something of me. So when do I find my free time? (Oh wait, what's free time?) Nap time. Sometimes, nap time.
And I wouldn't trade it for the world.
You know, I'd like to share a piece of my heart for a moment - and please take this all in context. I love my children - even through their flaws. And that love comes at great cost. Please hear me out, I am not complaining, this motherhood is a choice, but it really is a hard one. I could spend my time working to put my kids in daycare and I'm sure they would turn out to be fairly decent kids. But coming home and being with them 24/7 was a sacrifice, but the right sacrifice.
I feel like all I ever talk about is my kids sometimes. But you must understand, that's what I do right now in my life. I try hard not to dominate conversations and speak about stuff other than funny sayings, booger noses, and explosive diapers - but that is my world. You see, the most advanced conversation I get during the day is a quiet 5.5 y/o. Again, this is not complaining, I chose this and I am grateful for this - but this is just where I'm at.
And I'm not going to lie, there are moments and days in which I want to just put my kds ito someone's arms and get away from the crying and the neediness. There are times that I don't want to be a mom and if one more person asks me for one more thing I'm going to explode. And in those times I find myself on the porch swing, with an Anne of Green Gables book, and usually an Abi in my lap (because the kid won't let me put her down despite my trying).
Matt and I have been going through much comfort-zone pushing. So many times I feel like we're standing on the edge of life, about to fall into a huge adventure. And there are so many days that I feel like Matt is experiencing the adventure of the real world, and I am watching our kids.
There is so much that I want to do and be a part of and see and experience - and then two little ones look at me and have their list of requirements. And some things go back on the shelf for a later in life yet to come.
Do not pity me, please, I am not asking for your pity. I just invite you friends into my life.
Matt is a fantastic husband. Hear that loud and clear. Our church blesses us beyond measure. And I wouldn't trade our little family for the world. But with the place that we're at in life comes much sacrifice. I wonder how my mother felt raising Jes and I while Daddy was at work. She talks of having very few friends - if even any at all - and the financial restraints that they overcame. We were her world, I know it because I was there - and yet I wonder if there were times that she just wanted to be "out there" in the world.
It's funny but staying at home with our kids makes you feel like you're running your life in a different world than most. A 9-5 exists for everyone but you. And when Matt comes home and everyone is off from work, I want so much to spend family time together and raise our kids together that most days friendships occur at scheduled times maybe once/week.
Maybe I am just being welcomed to adulthood - maybe it's more.
I don't regret leaving work - like really how could I? I don't miss the chaos of all the work and the feeling of swimming in created stress imposed upon me by unrealistic requirements (since my employments end my boss has resigned and no one has taken her place and according to past work friends - work is a TOTALLY different place and has changed for the better).
But what I do miss is the adult conversation. I miss feeling like I know anything about what's going on outside of this house. I usually get relayed information, if it gets to me at all, and it's funny how isolating a few kids can be to a 25y/o when most of her friends have either just gotten married or are engaged.
It's odd to be the first to enter into their mid-thirties lifestyle while still 25. It's so weird to be stranded in an age gap at our church - where my closest church friends have kids that are stock-piling our youth group. I am grateful for a friend in Ellen - and I've come to realise how i need her. Somehow being a mom of 2 kids at 25 isn't as ridiculous and isolating with a 26y/o sister in law who's mom of 3.
I wouldn't trade these babies for the world - as little Abi coos at me from my lap. And while the pendulum can feel like it swings to great isolation some days, I find my peace in the other side's company. I just want to be real in admitting where I am. Sometimes my greatest company is a fictional world in Anne of Green Gables, where the storyline can wait through my chaos for another porch swing moment to come - and then it picks up where it left off.
I need to get off of here, Abi's announcing her urgent needs.
Just wanted to post something real - not that my other posts are not real.
Thanks for reading this, those of you that still are.