Starting Out

I’ve thought about starting a blog for a long time now. I’ve always been hesitant because I have never been a very good writer and my grammar skills are sub par at best! So please be kind and bear with me!

So a little bit about me. I was born and raised in a small town in southern Indiana. My parents are divorced and my mom married my stepdad some years back. I’m at my husband when I was 14 and 8th grade band class if you could believe it. He played the tuba and I played the clarinet. What a pair indeed! We started the summer of our freshman year and have been together ever since. We both share the same birthday including the year. We were married on our 21st birthday in a little tiny Church back in our hometown. Since then we have become homeowners and the proud parents of four kiddos. Three of which are our own by birth and one who is our Beautiful Exchange daughter from Taiwan. Although I did not give birth to her she will forever be a part of our family and our “adopted” daughter.

The last decade of our life has been filled with graduating college, multiple career changes, Parenthood, 2 fur babies, and now our most recent Endeavor is expanding and adding onto our little chicken farm.

I worked as a CNA on the post surgical unit at our local hospital for about 6 years. When I got pregnant and had our last child I had to quit being full time and go to part-time. Childcare was so expensive between our kiddos that I wound up having to quit my job and be a full-time stay-at-home mom. My husband was promoted to one of the detective positions at our local police station and by the grace of God we have been surviving off of one income for a couple years now. It hasn’t been easy but the Lord has always provided. My intention is to return to work at some capacity once our daughter gets into full-time preschool but we shall see what the future holds.

As a mama who has experienced working full-time as a parent and being a full-time stay-at-home parent let me be the first to say that everyone who told me I’m so lucky not to have a real job and that being a stay-at-home parent is so easy…lied! Don’t get me wrong I have been so blessed to be able to stay home and raise my own kiddos. There is no doubt or question about that. But let me be the first to say that being a stay-at-home mom is not all it’s cracked up to be! If only it were as easy as lounging around all day in my bathrobe, sipping on a glass of wine, and napping as I pleased with not a care in the world… then yeah, I’d say easy peasy. If I’m being totally honest though, I definitely make time for a nap when my daughter naps. Naps have become a essential in my life. And I say that without shame or remorse!

Being a stay at home mom is a whole new type of chaos and stress. Sometimes I find myself missing the chaos of work days. Not to mention that it’s easy to fall in a slump when it feels like you’re trapped inside day in and day out, constantly being stuck in the same routine. Even though I get out and run my kids everywhere it’s still tends to feel like I never have “ME” time. As a mom it’s easy to exert all your time and energy into your family that by the end of the day you’re too tired to care for yourself.

Have y’all ever had those days where are you neglected yourself and you finally had that 3rd breakdown of the day and wonder when the last time you ate, slept, or even showered was? Dishes are constantly piled up right after you do them, laundry is a never-ending battle, you are constantly picking up behind your kids because nobody in the house knows what a laundry basket is or where they got their stuff from , and you’re pretty sure if you have to “name that Pokemon”, listen about Pokémon, Bakugan, and/or Minecraft trivia, or hear the word “moooooommmmm” one more time you are going to go ahead and commit yourself to the psych ward. If not, Keep On scrolling because this post is probably not for you!

Finding balance between my husband, children, family, and myself has been one of the trickiest parts about being a parent. To be honest it was a hard pill for me to swallow that if I don’t take care of myself both mentally, spiritually, and physically then how can I expect to give my absolute best to my family? Let’s just say that this is all still a work in progress. So here I am starting my very first blog at 32 in hopes of keeping myself sane and taking life one day at a time.