Heaven Help Me!

I am wearing black today. Both of my Roombas died within a week of each other. Bad timing I say. School is about to start and there is NO way I want to even attempt to keep my house clean without these little buddies of mine.

They work to keep my house immaculate all day long, while I cook, clean up, read and teach the kids all day long. I have to say that this is a modern convenience I do not like to do without. Mud, grass, cereal spilled all over the floor…I can continue teaching and the kids can continue learning while the Roomba cleans them up.

However, when I have to go without them, I pause before ordering new ones. Here’s why:

1. While it is not outside of the realm of my vocation to own these devices, it may be outside the realm for my children. What I mean is that I know for sure that it is ok for me (as a homeschooling mother of six, and a wife, a sister, a daughter and a friend) to use any tool necessary to get done what I need to get done in my day. However, I know I need to instill good work habits in my children, and using a robot to clean may not do this. I especially became concerned about this when I asked my six year old to sweep the floor the other day, and, instead she pulled out the Roomba to do it, pushed the ‘on’ button, then ran off to play (until I called her back to do it the way I asked).  Well, I don’t blame her – it makes my life easier, too! How can I ask them to sweep the floor, when I prefer the Roomba over a broom myself?

2. They are expensive! The going rate right now for a Roomba is $199 for the base model.  This is a lot of money for us. Still, it is cheaper than weekly maid service, which costs $120 a week for our home. I can use the Roomba daily for a year and pay a total of $199. That seems to be the better deal.

3. They break.  The Roombas I have owned are susceptible to “technical difficulties”. They require some kind of fixing or cleaning (cleaning a vacuum cleaner? yes, that’s the annoying part!) after using them for a couple months. The batteries wear out quickly and they eventually just break down. IRobot customer service used to be wonderful and based in USA, but lately it has gone downhill.

4. The less fortunate do not own these. Through centuries women have cooked and cleaned like madwomen and somehow found a way to live without dishwashers, roombas and the like. In particular, the less fortunate throughout the world today do not have such things – it bothers my conscience to be so spoiled. At the same time, I know women with large families in the 40′s & 50′s who had nervous breakdowns from trying to “do it all”.  My dishwasher helps my children get read to more often, and keeps my kitchen from becoming grossly unsanitary. To me, a Roomba is another tool that helps me achieve this goal. I guess the solution is to use these tools mindful of how fortunate I am, but also mindful that I haven’t found a perfect solution yet.

VS.

Any opinions?

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Husband and I have always been interested in what makes a successful marriage “tick”. When we were newly engaged, we played out different scenarios in our minds about who would stay home and who would go to work. We mutually hyphenated our names when we got married. We knew the flexibility of modern marriage did not confine us to certain roles.

In practice, it turned out I was not destined for a career outside the home, as I immediately embraced staying home when our firstborn son was born. I was “into” cooking and cleaning and caring for children and found great fulfillment in it. I loved reading the children stories for hours on end, playing with blocks and making birthday cakes. Changing diapers wasn’t all that bad, as long as I got to do these other things, too.

Throughout the years, marriage and the idea of a “good wife” has been “reinvented” multiple times. This is the focus of an article written by Lisa Belkin in the March 22, 2010 edition of the New York Times, entitled, “The Marrying Kind”.

All this redefinition has become possible as women have been given more choices. While some of it has been helpful, as a fairly traditional woman who stays home with my children, and tries to make a home for my husband, I have found some of it a maze to navigate. My impression of what makes “a good wife” has been subject to society’s influence over time, particularly when I was young and forming these ideals. I believe I had the “perfect mother” – she tended to my two brothers and my needs with extraordinary devotion and care, in a way I’m quite afraid to admit that I am unable to do myself today. Dinner with all food groups represented every night at 6:30pm, Sunday brunch without fail, meticulous attention to detail when we were sick. Although I have twice as many children as her, and my life choices have dictated that I won’t be able to pull off motherhood with as much careful concern as she did, a part of me still wishes I could. At the same time, I am grateful that the standards aren’t so perfectionistically high that this type of care come solely from me (my husband is just as active in it).

However, the “osmosis” education that my peers and I received to become a H.I.T. (Homemaker in Training) was conflicting at best. It tooted the benefits & supposed freedom of being a ‘supermom’, who could “bring home the bacon AND fry it up in the pan”, just like the Enjoli perfume commercial said. In other words, we were told we could be a mom just like my mom and a career embracing feminist, as well. In high school, we had a home economics class (one of the most popular classes!) in which we all donned aprons and baked apple pies during school hours. When that class ended, we were whisked off to the next class, “Business Economics” which encouraged us to have skills for a successful career outside the home. Confusing? I’ll say. And most of us still don’t know how to make homemade gravy from scratch.

In the aforementioned article, Ms. Belkin highlights the latest “twist” in the redefinition of marriage and what it means to be a good wife: the fastest growing subset of cohabitating couples today are over the age of 50. These women, having been previously married and lived out the “ideal Mrs.” – having wanted nothing more from life than to don the apron and be married -now scoff at it. These women, who were enmeshed in that rejection of the “old ways”;  ”housewives” protesting they were not married to their houses, began calling themselves the more respectable title of  ”working moms” instead. Gradually, we have realized since then that “Supermom”, due to its unattainability, is more comic than reality. Seeing the old guideposts gone, what impetus is there to follow?

Women today are not what they were and as a result we are probably much more relaxed and reasonable. It is perfectly fine to enlist the help of a device to do housework, instead of scrubbing each square of bathroom tile with a toothbrush like grandma did. With the constant redefining of our roles, it will be interesting to see the scenario play out.

On that note, I am off to eat a wonderful meal, home-cooked by my husband, who is a five star *Mr. Mom*, doing all the cleaning and homekeeping while I recover from birth. In the “old days”, it might be unthinkable that Mom or Mom-in-law would not be at my side for two weeks, so hubby could get back to work since he was clueless when it came to running a home. However, this is not the case for us, nor for many women today. Due to this redefinition of roles for women, our mothers, *too*, have the freedom they earned themselves thirty years ago.

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I entered the kitchen after breakfast to find a new creation waiting for me.

This is none other than “Frankensoap”, the work of my ten year-old daughter’s imagination and skilled hands.

There is never a dull moment in my home. The kids have the most fun when I don’t know what they are doing.

The story behind this soap is as follows…for the first time in my life, I had to refill the liquid soap containers with bright orange gooey liquid soap.

This is because the store was out of the kind I usually buy the clear-bluish marine-ish smelling one that we all like.

Little did I know the choas this would cause.

The first picture above shows the kind of liquid soap that comes out foamy when dispensed. It is this way because it is more diluted than the  kind in the second picture. The problem is that when you dilute the orange soap (to use it in the “foamy” containers) it turns an interesting color.

At least that’s what the kids say. Some of my kids are at that age where anything remotely yellow “looks like pee”. I would say they are “urine-phobic”, as the presence of urine (actually, anything that could possibly BE urine, even a puddle of water on the floor) causes them to flee screaming and yelling “Ewww! Yuck!!!” in every direction of the house as fast as possible.

The first time I refilled the one in the bathroom, the kids filed in one by one to ask me, “Mom what is that disgusting stuff on the counter in the soap dispenser?!”, or “Mom”, (in almost a whisper),  is that what I think it is?”

“Uh, guys…It’s SOAP.”

Nevertheless, I could see their point, and agreed with them. SO, we came up with a solution – food coloring!

One drop of blue food coloring made the foamy yellow liquid a splendid turquoise color! Perfect. Problem solved!

However, I’m afraid the creator of this version of turquoise got the recipe wrong. And overdid the blue.

Therefore, we now have the above version of  “Frankensoap” sitting by my kitchen sink. The good news is the overdose of blue doesn’t stain skin!

I gotta give them credit for trying to help…right?

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Abt Electronics

Bosch Evolution 500 Series 24″ White Undercounter Dishwasher – SHE45M02WH/ Two-Pump Motor System/ Suspension Motor/ Five Level Wash/ Flow Through Water Heater/ Multi-Function LED/ Condensation Drying/ AQUASTOP Leak Protection/ 4 Wash Cycles/ Optional Half Load Wash/ 14 Place Settings/ White Fi…

Bosch Evolution 500 Series 24″ White Undercounter Dishwasher

Better than past dishwashers I’ve owned!

ChiChristine Chicago, IL 6/1/2009

5 5

Pros: Cleans Well

Cons: Awkward Loading, Doesn’t Dry Well

Best Uses: General Purpose

Describe Yourself: Casual Cook

We have large family and needed a dishwasher that could handle the amount of dishes we use. We run it several times daily. It has been installed for three weeks, and so far I don’t have a single complaint. Most importantly, as long as you scrape the plates of large food particles, it gets the dishes clean and does not leave any residue on them. It is also energy efficient, quiet, and has simple controls. If it keeps this up, I will recommend it to EVERYONE as the best dishwasher money can buy!

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****UPDATE: July 6, 2009 – This dishwasher continues to be the best thing since sliced bread! Really, it is worth every penny! I have had spotless dishes ever since I bought it;  the “awkward loading” isn’t so awkward anymore, and  “doesn’t dry well”  isn’t too noticeable to me anymore. Considering the dishes are so clean, I don’t have to re-wash them, I really don’t give a rip about a little water left on top of the glasses!

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With the return to work and school means a return to our family following a schedule to get all the things done in a day that we want to get done. I based our family schedule on a book by Holly Pierlot entitled A Mother’s Rule of Life: How to Bring Order to Your Home and Peace to Your Soul. I highly recommend it. The basis of the book is that 1.) It is possible for your family to live according to a schedule, 2.) such a schedule will order the day and create peace within your home, 3.) many good opportunities are lost due to the lack of a family schedule, 4.) A family schedule can improve your marriage and relationships with your children because those things which previously could “never happen” now have a set time on the schedule to make sure they occur. *This could be as simple as a set time for husband and wife to talk & spend time together ever day (not meant to make the husband/wife relationship something either has to “stand in line” for, but it happens every day because it is listed on the schedule. )

People often wonder how I have the time to accomplish everything i do. Most just completely “freak-out” when I tell them I am a homeschooling mom with five kids. The secret is the schedule. Our family’s schedule can be found here: basic-winter-2009-schedule .  “The schedule” can be liberating when followed, because it ensures that we use each moment thoughtfully and wisely, but occasionally it can become a monkey on my back of endless structure and demands (that is when we take a day off from it). I have always enjoyed a more free-flowing existence more than structure… sometimes I know I HAVE to stick to and enforce the family schedule because it’s the right thing to do for others. I undertake it for the sake of the souls placed in my care. It is with this thought that I realize the work God has given me to do is absolutely designed to get me to heaven. The schedule is a tool one can use to get there. Whether or not I use it is up to my free will. He leads me, but doesn’t drag me. He respects my free will, and watches me silently as I grumble about if only my carcass was more diligent, if only I would cooperate more with the grace He freely offers me, I could accomplish so much greater things. As I age, I realize one of the biggest regrets of my life is the time I have wasted, not using each moment to the fullest to accomplish some greater good. May 2009 be lived out with diligence to my responsibilities. The schedule can help me do this. HAPPY NEW YEAR!

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A friend sent me the following link, which I am posting for Moms out there who struggle with not being able to do all they used to do. Whether due to larger family size, unforeseen events or just plain old age, we have all been forced to streamline things. Priorities scream themselves out from the background and make themselves unmistakably known (hopefully, that is!) . Like the author, I have simplified my cooking very much over the years – while my husband used to get a well-balanced gourmet breakfast daily when we were newlyweds (with each food group represented and in complimentary colors, mind you!) , now he gets a cup of coffee if he’s lucky. I had always dreamed of feeding my family beautifully prepared meals, but I kissed that dream goodbye long ago. One invaluable skill I learned B.C. (“before children”) was how to make the absolute best homemade bread on the planet! I have managed to perfect and make home-made bread (except during times of late pregnancy and newborn babies) for the past thirteen years. Although these days, it is pretty much utilitarian, bread making has the potential to be quite a prayerful experience. Kneading the dough, praying for those who would eat it, sitting at a table breaking bread together…It is something I don’t want to streamline out of my busy day because of the “gap” it would leave. I might not cook much anymore, but we almost always have a loaf of home-made bread around.

At any rate, all this busy-ness in my life has caught up to me. How appropriate that I realize this during the season of Lent: I cannot go on. I have to change. I was buoyed up and experienced liberating freedom yesterday in the Sacrament of Confession. I am not always a good mom, I am not always a supportive wife, and our Lord is very patient with my increasingly seldom & forgotten attempts to chat with Him throughout my day. Why am I not what I was? The grace is given to me through the Sacrament of Matrimony to be “good enough” at my vocation… hopefully better! I claim those graces today and amend my life in trying to be more kind, more patient, and more supportive to those God has given me to take care of for Him.

‘Good Enough’ Mom

I pause in the supermarket aisle with an oversized cardboard box in my hand. I want to buy it — and yet something inside me recoils at the thought of placing this particular item in my shopping cart.

My fingers clutch the cardboard as I study the label: 100% Real Potatoes. Mashed potatoes in minutes. To a woman standing in the aisle of the grocery store at 4:30 p.m. with no real plan for dinner and an 18-month-old Houdini who is escaping the shopping cart harness, the idea is downright delicious.

And yet I hesitate, because I used to be a cooking snob. And some small part of me still wants to claim that title. Once upon a time, everything from my kitchen was absolutely, positively made from scratch. Frozen waffles? Inferior! Bread from the store? Puh-leeze! Potatoes from a box? Unthinkable!

But I had only a few very small children back then. Since that time, God has blessed me with more babies. He gave me pregnancies where I wound up useless on the couch or kneeling in front of a toilet bowl for weeks on end. He gave me more bodies to feed, more clothing to launder, and more dishes to wash. Those first babies grew older, and we began homeschooling. I never ran out of love, but some days I surely did run out of time and energy.

Somewhere along the way, out of sheer necessity, I made some cooking concessions. With a family that could eat its way through a loaf of bread in a single lunchtime, I gave in to the convenience of the store-bought stuff. Homemade bread-baking became a once in a while treat, made only with the help of my trusty Kitchen Aid mixer. And ultimately, even a snob like me had to admit that brownies from a mix tasted lots better than the homemade ones I never baked anymore.

I made these concessions, but not without some measure of guilt. Preparing exclusively homemade food for my family had been a point of pride for me. It had been a tangible way for me to assure myself I was being a “good mom.” I was fooling myself, but it was a comfortable con.

I have a friend who likes to tell her husband in the morning before he leaves for work: “I can do two out of these three things today: homeschool, keep the house clean, or make a good dinner. Which two would you like?”

I love this approach because I find it a helpful reminder that, no matter what Cosmopolitan magazine might try to sell you, none of us can “do it all.” Besides, as every mother knows, even if we did find a way to do it all, it surely wouldn’t stay done. We must pick and choose the good things we will do. It’s a continual balance. Today, for example, I am choosing: I will serve lunch on paper plates, but read Curious George Gets a Medal. I will catch up on the laundry, but let that sticky spot on the kitchen tiles sit for just one more day. I will make muffins for an afternoon snack, but won’t answer emails. I will chat on the phone with a friend for 30 minutes, but forget to make my kids’ dental appointments.

And I will buy the boxed potatoes. One-hundred percent real potatoes for my 100 percent real life.

I will stand at the stove with a toddler on my hip and stir instant potatoes with one hand while a whirlwind of family life encircles me. I will spell “immortal” for the 9-year-old who asks me. I will interrupt one grinning child’s rendition of the “K-I-S-S-I-N-G” song with his brother’s name in it before the affronted party resorts to death blows. And when my garrulous four-year-old asks, “Would you like to hear a story?” I will refrain from sighing and rolling my eyes. I will smile weakly and say, “Yes, sweetie. Talk to mama while I make dinner.”

Today I will focus on things I do right instead of the things I do wrong or that remain undone. I will find security and satisfaction in knowing that none of us can do it all, but that I am doing enough. None of us can have it all, but I have what really matters.

I am not a perfect mom, but with God’s grace I can be a good one. I can give this family, right here, right now, the very best I have. One-hundred percent.

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