Introductions and other Ramblings of a SAHM

There are times in life that you just can't say where your life is going. You can guess at it. You can hope and wonder with boundless optimism. But you're never quite sure how everything will pan out (or if it will pan out at all) and it is a uniquely terrifying and liberating experience all at once. Finding yourself with two children under the age of two is one of those experiences, and in our society today perhaps even something unique in life.

To give you some background I am and always have been someone who likes things just so- good enough has never been truly good enough. So when our big girl, the Ginger Ninja, E joined our family I was shattered by the adjustment. She is spirited and clever and wild and particular- she is every inch her mother. And being like me she is trying and difficult and stubborn as a mule so she made for a crazy baby phase. I took solace however, in putting together activities for my girl to work on to hone her developing skill sets, in putting together literacy programs, in developing all things E. Then I found out I was pregnant with K when E was 7 months old.

K has been our sweet, chubby, marginally less excitable baby since day one and I love her for it. She is still a baby and by virtue of that fact demands a great deal of my time as a stay-at-home mother. Balancing PPD/PPA, nursing, honing the development of both my sweet girls, keeping the house and cooking have all been struggles for me to this point because having moved to a small town away from our support base when E was 5 months old I have no help. It has driven me to a sort of productive neuroses that I think a lot of moms who are truly on their own much of the time share. You become frazzled by the thought of folding another load of laundry, while rocking another whiney baby, whilst singing "If You're Happy and You Know it" for the 318,765th time that day and planning an afternoon activity- and yet you do it all anyway. You come back fighting to do better because you ARE better for being this neurotic woman who at times fervently prays for naptime to come. She makes you better even when she's tearing you down.

It was the realization that I can't be the only person in the world who keeps getting back up and trying harder that inspired me to finally put this out there. Lord knows enough people over the years have told me I need to right a book (HA! How much time do you have?). I want to find that community of women, wherever you are and bring us all together. I want to share with you the sheer insanity of day long temper tantrums, the wonder of construction paper outfit crafts, the magic that is child literacy, the absolute laundry witchcraft that is my stain fighting regime (You know you want it ;) ), my love for "mom-tography" and the cooking adventures that nourish our families bodies and souls.

To quote a favorite book of mine as a teen, "[Sometimes] You have to lose your mind to find your heart." . So lose your mind with me (I'm ahead of the game, I lost mine months ago- catch up now my duck!), in all the madness and beauty that is the journey through motherhood- with a touch of OCD! We might just find something we're both looking for...