My dirty little secret…I am not Wonder Woman

I am going to confess something that makes me uncomfortable. I am somewhere between 2 worlds. I am both a SAHM and a WAHM.  I work from home, but the fact is when you are starting a business, it can take a while before you actually contribute income into the family. In fact starting a business where you design and build products takes capital. We have spent at least what is considered the average family income on starting this business, and it will take some time before we see return on our investment. Everything we make goes back into the business to keep branding and keep building product. So I am between two worlds and my guilty secret is that in order to do my business, I need to have childcare. We have an au pair. Yes I said it. I make no money, and spend money to build a business and I pay someone to help me with my kids. Seems an odd way to contribute to the family, right? Hence, my guilt.

Since I essentially work for myself I think I should just arrange my schedule around the kids. I appear to other moms like a SAHM - I volunteer at school and drive the kids to after school activities. I will leave the baby at home with our au pair and while I am waiting at an activity for the other 2, I am making or returning calls. Some times I am editing something I have written or looking at fabric prints. I am multitasking the best I can, but I couldn’t do it without help. The people that don’t know I have a business look at me like, “wow she has full-time help and stays at home - nice”. Believe me I am not lunching and shopping, however without an income to show “hey, I am working”, I do feel embarrassed.

My SAHM friends, they do it all on their own. I consider them super moms. I even have WAHM friends that don’t have help, and I am amazed at how they do it, they are wonder moms, super women. Me, I am not either of these things. I just don’t have it in me to be a good mom, wife and business woman alone. I get grumpy and overwhelmed. I know my limitations, but even with that,  I still would rather be wonder woman.

There, my dirty little secret, it’s out. The kicker is our absolutely fabulous au pair has fallen in love (good for her), is getting married and leaving us next month to move to Ohio with her new husband. So this summer,  I better figure out how to get some super powers fast.

Memorial Day Cookouts 1, 2, 3…

Memorial Day

Memorial Day weekend has become to mean the first weekend of summer. Although summer doesn’t “official” begin until June 21st (the summer solstice and the longest day of the year in terms of daylight), for most Americans Memorial Day weekend is summer. Our neighborhood pool opens and pools all over the country and it is the count down to summer vacation (I don’t know, isn’t that an oxymoron - my kids home all summer doesn’t really feel like a vacation - ha!)

As a family, we have spent the weekend going from one cookout to another and to the pool. We couldn’t even cookout ourselves this weekend, cause well we weren’t home! Saturday we were at a friend’s cookout and pool opening get together. Kids were in the pool all day, seriously, they were in bed by 8pm, with no fuss - out. Sunday we went to our neighborhood pool, but they were too tired to swim! Our 4 year old, Asher, fell asleep on his towel and chair after only being at the pool for 20 minutes - my husband had to carry him to the car. At home proceeded to sleep another 3 hours (!) before it was time to go to, you guessed it, the next cookout. This one started at 6.30pm on Sunday night. It was at one of my husband’s co-workers house. We had the youngest kids there. Our kids are THRILLED to follow around the big kids (pre-teens/teens). Luckily these big kids were terribly sweet to ours and let them follow them around and took care of them. Honestly, one older boy was asked to take care of Asher, and another boy said “I want to take care of him too”. So nice to see this!

We were able to  have a nice time without any worries about the kids (of course, except for the 11 month old, who was in her sling enjoying the adult conversation, food & desperately trying to get a sip of mommy’s margarita! We didn’t get home until after 11pm! Didn’t stop them from waking up again at 7am.

In a little bit we are going to cookout #3 for the weekend, Memorial Day weekend. Kids are asking who’s birthday it is? Why do we have so many parties? We are trying to explain the meaning of Memorial Day. Right now they are just see this weekend as pool, watermelon, and fun. And it is embarrassing to say, but sometimes I forget about the meaning. It gets lost for me in the cookouts and time at the pool. This is my reminder and for anyone else out there lost in the fun and celebration.

Memorial Day is a day of remembrance for those who have died in our nation’s service.

I just wanted to take a personal moment to remember our troops and all those that have sacrificed their lives for our country. And say thank you.

Here is a great video someone put on youtube.

True Meaning of Memorial Day

Eat. Shop. Laugh.

These 3 words describe this past weekend. They aren’t the only words, more would be drink, smile, reminiscing, renew, pamper, and sleep. I had the opportunity to have a girls weekend in Chicago. My best friend from high school, Jodie (we have been friends since we were kids some 30+ years), and I flew to Chicago on Friday evening to go stay with people we reconnected with on Facebook. Yes, sounds crazy but felt so natural. In the last 6 months or so on Facebook, I have found and been found by a bunch of old high school classmates.

High school is so long ago but even so there are people from that time that time that were such an important part of my life, my growing up. Two women in particular (Dana and Robin), these were the two we went to see after having lost touch for 20 years. In high school they were funny, crazy and really warm loving people. They haven’t changed a bit. I laughed so much this weekend I thought my side was going to split. The friendship we left behind renewed itself in minutes of being with them. Actually it was renewed the moment we reconnected on Facebook. Funny, how time and distance doesn’t seem to affect some friendships. It was such a whim to take them up on the offer to visit in Chicago, but it felt right. And it was, the only regret from the weekend is that it was too short for us all. The 20 years apart, just disappeared and we took up where we left off.

Pampering breakfast from Robin - Delicious!

What made this weekend so perfect? I already said the laughter, great conversation and well, gossip (”who do you keep in touch with?” “whatever happened to so and so?’ “They really got married? No way!”). Great food was an integral part of the weekend.  I am the only one with kids, and my main request was no kid friendly restaurants. I mostly took pictures of food - isn’t that sad?

We started our weekend on Friday night with Margaritas, home-made gaucamole, & chips in Robin’s beautiful, showroom apartment over looking Chicago. We relaxed. Saturday, she made us the most perfect breakfast/brunch - frittata (honestly, I don’t know how to make this, and she did it like this was her usual weekend routine!), fresh fruit salad, & freshly baked cinnamon buns. Come on, could a girl get pampered anymore? So nice to not have to do the cooking, or cut the food or  hear “Mom, I’m firsty” just as I sit down to eat!

After lazily having breakfast, we finally got out into the city after 12pm (yes, a slow moving, lazy weekend!) and went shopping. We must have spent hours at Nordstrom, where I got a very long overdue pair of new jeans (last time I bought was 4+ years ago, trying on jeans not my favorite pastime).

All that hard work shopping (and laughing), made us hungry. So sushi was our choice. Of course delicious, and the presentation fabulous!

Sushi dragon roll that actually had a head Pretty cool.

Getting ready to go out to dinner (ya, we moved our reservations at Boka to 9pm since our sushi lunch was so late), it felt like high school again. We remembered getting ready to go out at my house. I think we almost always got ready at my house, and after our evening, everyone spent the night at my house. Mostly because my mom was super trusting and I didn’t have a curfew. Funny thing was, I had no boundaries, so I created my own, whereas all my friends had boundaries and wanted to rebel. I wonder how I will be as my kids become teenagers. Not sure if my mother’s method worked or if I was just born overly responsible. This is really something I don’t want to think about - I want my kids to stay 6 and under forever!

One of the funniest things about the weekend, is that it felt weird ordering drinks and wine. The last time we were all together we were, well, underage. Not that we didn’t drink, but this time we were legal. And very much so, 40 is just a few short months away! We have come a long way from the Bartles & James wine coolers (seriously, we drank those - uugh).

I think we are all grown up. I am not sure any of our lives have turned out as we expected in high school. Not better or worse, just different. But the people we were then, are still the core of who we are today, and the friendship we shared then has stayed with us forever.

Our weekend together was so perfect, we have decided to make it an annual girls trip with just the 4 of us. Picking a new city each year to meet, eat, shop, and laugh. I can’t wait to start planning for next year!