The great adventure of 4

I don't post much lately... which is quite sad. Honestly sad.

I do miss blogging, I miss sharing... but who knew 4 babies would alter your train of thought.

Each child uniquely easy... one likes colouring, the other to play outside, one reading or Dora episodes on TV and the other just breastfeeding... but put them together and somehow more than one is begging for your attention.

There is a ton of learning patience that wouldn't be taught if there was one or even just 2. Someone daily feels they got the shaft... but what they don't realize its been 2 hours since I started making something for myself to eat and then I get asked to make a snack for someone, change a diaper, read this note from the teacher, put on this movie, help my jacket is stuck, mom she called me the S word... ohhh and my warm bagel is no longer warm, my coffee is frozen and I still haven't fed myself.

Then the emails come through; Girl Guides telling me about the week's activities, dancing, the principal's emails, text messages come through, read them but someone is calling your name or someone just spilt something on the brand new hardwood floors.

Nothing gets a response... I get an Instagram picture in, I see a quick article on Facebook (I am entrenched in this measles outbreak and what I think is encroaching on people's Human Rights by forcing vaccines but that's for another post) and I share it. The news is playing in the background but I can't hear what its saying... I catch tidbits here and there.

By the time dinner comes around there is a mountain of laundry sitting on the couch to be folded and then headed to bed its silly chaos. Something about the words "ok, everyone upstairs let's get ready for bed" means lets go upstairs jump on the beds, be extra silly, take forever to put on pjs. Eldest reads to the baby, putting on a diaper of my toddler (wishing and praying she'd go pee in a potty) the slowest to get ready is doing God knows what instead of brushing her teeth. And then they are all ready.

and all I want to do...

is take pictures of them because at this very moment they never looked more beautiful, more sweet, more loving and just perfect.

Being a mom of 4 isn't easy but being a mom to these 4 is a blessing. And while I miss blogging I understand that it needs to come when it can because right now I am busy being mom.

Pushing through Me as Mom!

Lately I have been bombarded with comments and conversations about being Mom, being Social Mom and a Mom Blogger.

When did being pigeon-holed into a category make people feel the right to pass judgement, I read a blog about non-moms being the evil that the perils of being mom were misunderstood... but we're we moms not non-moms at one point in time. Then I read scathing twitter comments my most disturbing; "mom bloggers write blogs just so they can feel cool again." Best part it was from a fellow female. I don't understand this harbouring of resentment, I don't understand the lack of consideration in your fellow, human or even your fellow female.

I am a MOM, I may have worked in Editorial for a brief moment, been in the social circle before having kids, and please cool.... anyone even using the term can't really consider themselves cool! But when did a mom writing and sharing become so unattractive to those who don't have kids... why I ask, why do I care? Well because at one point in time some single living it up women will become the moms that they disparage in public forums.

I call it as it is, a huge amount of foot in mouth syndrome, where without taking precautions we speak without thinking. I take responsibility for the opinions I make, but I also like being called out on my shit, because I believe that owning up to offending people, learning from your lack of knowledge on a subject and just listening to an other's point of view makes me smarter and wiser on the subject may it reoccur in my life.

But most of all, I feel I have to defend my choice in parenthood, I wanted babies, I don't care that I worked in the most scathing industry that doesn't promote bearing children, I don't care that I have a social life that isn't very "mommy".... I don't like being pigeon-holed.... and believe that people do things for different reasons, it would be as I sitting here and commenting on why one doesn't have children, or moms who chose to stay home with their kids and don't leave their house... we do what "WE" want!

I do what I want... I want to stop feeling the need to defend my position. I want to be free of titles given to me by others, I want to be the funnest most outgoing mom, who does crafts with her girls, who goes swimming with them at the pool, who comes home and gets ready for a tweet-up or drinks with a girlfriend. Because I want to be me!

I tweeted this statement the other day; people assumed I was upset about something but I am just stating the obvious!

I am me, I am the best me I can be, I can't be you, you can't be me, there is only one of me!

Finding One's Self!

I don't tend to blog a lot about Motherhood, being that I am one of the firsts of my friends to have babies I never felt it my place to bombard my friend with talks of poop, parenting, late nights and exhaustion. Not to mention the lack of connection with ones body after a whole other body has left your own. Do I do it to not deter my friends, perhaps--- I think being a Mother is great, and would never tell someone anything that could make them change their minds in having something that truly has brought such utter joy into my life.

But there is something about becoming a mom, the added pressures that most don't understand til you are a mom, and the lack of self care that happens while you are trying to be Super Mom! Your brain hits serious over drive, not being all you can be really allows your brain to go into overdrive in the lack of who you are without your children and how much you can be for them because you want them to be proud of their mama!

So while you are tugging and pulling with your brain, your diet, excercise, work and children are tugging and pulling at you physically. And many of us have our A-HA moments! Mine was when my arm broke (only because imagine all those tasks and thoughts and then not being allowed to do them because you are FORCED to heal), truly presented me without an option than to confront my thoughts and how little I was taking care of myself.

Many Mommies have these moments, and here at Mommy Doings it just wouldn't be right to share these stories so that we can all know we've been there and we can get passed it, but most of all we are NOT alone!

Cheers!~

International Women's Day!

I went to French school all my life, one of my favorite words in french is a Souffragette! I won't go into a huge historical diatribe because you can find plenty of that online already, what you will learn about here is what I like to call:

The New Feminist!

What is the new feminist you might be asking over in front of you computer screen, well the truth is she a lot like ME! The new Feminist is a lot like the Souffragettes, with their passion for equality and voices being heard, but not the same as those who burnt their bras decades ago. I understand those ladies who marched and burn their bras and shun the establishments and how they fostered a newness to the new feminist that gives us a larger ability to attain the rights that those first feminists wanted.



Let me describe you the NEW feminist... she is most likely married or looking to get married. Honestly she might not want to ever get married, but she is looking to be in a committed relationship because that is what SHE wants, she doesn't want it for her parents sake, she isn't doing it to drive up her value at work and really doesn't care what those around her think, she will be married, young, old, living in with someone or living alone and sharing her space with someone who comes over to sleep. But she wants something and she's going for it!

These particularly married or not Feminists are actually bearing children and loving every moment of the idea... why because they don't sit under the bubble of what a mother does from the point of view of others, a huge shift of staying home feminists, because they don't want bigger homes, or more cars, they breastfeed, pump or bottle feed. They parent educationally, they work if it's their passion, they play because they are released of the pressures of judgements of others because they don't actually CARE about being pigeon-holed in a criteria.

These Feminists have passion... no seriously! They are driven, they work hard, they hire help when they know it's in no one's best interest for them to be in charge of this task. They read newspapers, recipe books, HTML codes, blogs and Ikea manuals... most of all they share and are social, they like it, they need it and most of all they enjoy it. They go out for drinks while the other parent is watching the child, they leave laundry baskets to be folded on the living room floor to go to the gym, because they understand that they are a priority in the grand scheme of things. They really understand the basis of SHARE in a working relationship.



Best of all... sit down, this might make you want to be one of these FEMINISTS... they are HAPPY! I don't lie, they love taking their own life into their own hands, they thrive of being in charge of their schedule, they like to pick the work they do, the activities they participate in and all in all their primary focus is being Happy because they know that being happy is the only way to offer their best self to everyone around them; because that's what they want out of life.

So today, on International Women's Day, I encourage you to look at the women in your life and see those lovely NEW Feminist and smile at them, gifts aren't mandatory... but smile at them, because it's better than praise and WE somehow know how to store those smiles for our own needs when we need a fix.

HAPPY INTERNATIONAL WOMEN'S DAY!!!

Sitting in the audience...

Sometimes I do fun things... sometimes I just stay home and clean out my cupboards, but on both occasions I get happy.

Today, I got to sit in the audience of Steven and Chris on CBC, this is not my first time sitting in the audience, in my early 20s I got to sit in the audience over at CityLine and even get called in for another show for a hair makeover. But this format was different and a lot of fun, the show is done pre-tapped, and it's amusing to see the slip-ups and honesty that comes from these guys.

I went to the show with my mom and my coumbara (Greek for my daughter's godmother); my mother had never done anything like this before, the whole time she glowed, with a perma-smile. It was really nice to see that coming from her. She has had a hard couple of years and she deserved to do something out of her box, best part is I think she is hooked, she wants to go again. **which I think is so absolutely cute and endearing**

I wish I had taken my camera, perhaps next time! During all the commercial sections of the show, the audience warm-up guy gave some great gifts, we played some fun games... it was really more fun than I can explain.

If you want to catch the episode I was sitting through it will be on at 2pm on December 15th, early birthday gift!

Cheers!~

High Tide to you Monday Morning!!!

So another weekend went by again, they seem to be flying by for some reason... perhaps it's the abundance of sun and how late the days go. But my weekend, which I hoping to be slightly more productive did come and go.

Not much happening here, I am repainting my bathroom, my dining room, deciding where the electrical outlets will be going in my master bedroom and debating if we can figure out an affordable budget to fix one of the bathrooms further in our very very old house.

I did go eat at a cute and interesting place near my home the other night, my mother was watching my girls for me and she had fed them so lovingly that me and the husband had to find some food but weren't looking to cook and add to clutter of piles of dishes that I had gotten through already earlier in the day. So I went and got a pick up order from GBK, if you don't know what that means... it's the Great Burger Kitchen. This little delight just opened around here but all the meat is grown here in Ontario and the animals are free ranged, the veggies are also locally grown... so it's suppose to be nicer on the carbon footprint we leave here.

But other than eating a little earth friendlier this week... I could not sleep last night... actually I can't sleep most nights. By the time I finally am off to dream land some people might be getting up for the morning. I wait it out so long, I finally do crash and then my husband so fantastically saves me from waking up in the morning by watching the girls.

What made today, this fair Monday morning so different... well, where do I start. So you know I am attempting to lose weight, I think I finally have come to terms with myself that under no circumstance is my current weight even remotely OK. But everyday is a struggle and for the first time if I fail or can't do it the next day I am not kicking myself into not working out for months on end, I just get back up the next day or the next couple of days and go workout as hard as I did the day before I just couldn't do it. But in this new found kick in my steps... in the fact that I actually JOGGED for the first time in my life this year, I had been eagerly wanting to go for a walk in the calm of night when really there isn't anyone out there and well start and perhaps into a longish JOG.

I can't believe I am saying this... A LONGISH JOG! Ha, if you know me personally, if you ever spent a moment with me you can see I am NOT a jogger, I was never a jogger. Even during my thinner years I wasn't your epitome of fitness. My core excercise was spending hours on end in a club shaking my ass to music, mostly house music all night. I actually will dance at a club and don't like going to clubs where people are making sure the walls are going to continue standing all night by hugging them as if they were to let go a large catastrophe might occur. (OK sorry tangent again... LOL!) But I was on my high school soccer team but I was not your star player, I played no other sport, I never rode a bike, I can't shoot a basketball into a basket and never learnt to do a cartwheel.

But today as I got out there and was walking at a pace that went on for the full 45 minutes (except for the slight jog I did), I was invigorated, full of live, even effervescent. So with NO sleep in me, I got out of my bed and hit the Toronto pavement it was 7:13AM as I left my house, I got the newspaper coming back around to my house and well everyone was still sleeping at 8AM, that I decided to head out to my backyard where I dug out the flower beds yesterday to make space for my vegetable garden that needs a ton of sun. So I entered my home 8:30AM and had already gone for my walk/jog and planted my carrots, celery and red peppers... I am feeling happily accomplished today!

So here is to a week of many mornings up early, many walks in the morning sun, many things accomplished by 8 am!!!

Cheers!~

Ohhh Busy Bee week!!

I had a bit of a busy week last week... I have so much to share and feel real guilty about the facet that I haven't posted in over a week.

Posts to come this week (in no specific order):

1. March of the Happiness Project, this is a work in process big time and so writing it out has been difficult, but it's coming.
2. The Great 13, I have been with my Husband for over 13 years, good, bad and even Ugly, triumphant and tear-jerking fantastic.
3. Gumball 3000... a little out of the ordinary post but a great outing I had a ton of fun on.
4. plus some fun other stuff.......

I have been working out, I have been doing wedding planning stuff for a friends upcoming wedding and well I have been Mom! So Mother's Day came and went... didn't get spoiled if you are going to ask. But I was with my family and that was all that mattered!

Cheers!

Organised Chaos!

I am a product of Organised Chaos...

If you know me I wouldn't read organised, I am a disheveled mess. My hair is usually the last thing on my priority list, I don't do my bed every morning and dishes will pile up high in my kitchen. Thus assuming I am a slob.

In a weird form of protest I think I have become this way due to the Organised Chaos that was my childhood. Why do I call it this... my mother's house immaculate, licking the floors possible. We lived in the house with the plastic on the living room couches, a dining room that was only for extreme special occasions. I don't remember, running, playing or enjoying our couches for anything other than birthdays and Christmas.

My mother the Queen of the Tidy... but would I say our lives were organised- NO! My mother had her crap together, her chores, her cleaning, her laundry, her ironing... stuff she felt she could control. But this didn't mean everything else was organised. From her frustration she yelled, when she wasn't interested in dealing with her life she wasted hours on end talking on the phone with friends forgetting dinner (because she wasn't hungry) as well as bed time (because well I was the quiet child and she didn't hear me so she didn't think much of dealing with me.)

Don't get me wrong I am not complaining about my mother... if you know me I love my mother with her quirks, I believe we behave and are the product of our rearing and my mother came from a bizarre and volatile household.

In return I protest... ask me where something is in my house, I can tell you, ask me someones phone number and it is memorised in my head (if I was left stranded in the middle of nowhere land I could call anyone). My disorganised house plays no affect on my personal well being... my children are happy and smart, I am loving and love being happy and I take no reflection from my personal possession. They don't make me, I am me with my stuff or without it- something that my mother didn't know how to teach us or show for herself.

We are that family you see at the beach playing in the mucky sand, making sand castles, getting our feet wet in the water, wetting our jeans but at home there might be dishes in my sink... because we are Happy!

Sometimes I get worried about other's opinions, what others might say... sometimes people don't keep their opinions to themselves and I listen and sometimes I let it bother me. But mostly I appreciate the people, the experiences and the love I have.

I am a different version of organised chaos... we appear to have chaos around us, but we are organised and happy instead of the organised exterior and the falling apart at the seams that my upbringing was.

Do you feel happy?

Working mom, struggles?

So I started a new job a few weeks ago!

Haven't been part of the working world for years, was dying to get back into the grind and apply myself and all of my talents to this great working world out there.

But who knew it would be far different than I had assumed for me and my little family; role reversal happened and my husband is at home with the girls far more than I am and well he's become Mr. Mom. I don't have any issues with that, actually I envisioned the day that this might actually be a reality... but I can't seem to balance. I get home so late... by the time we eat as a family and how late it is, my girls still aren't ready to sleep. Their days not as exhausting in the cold of winter, their time filled with large empty gaps and extra long naps recently, it's nearly MY bedtime and they are still up running circles around each other.

I am done, when I get to putting my eldest to bed, if I don't focus to stay awake I could find myself crashing and falling asleep beside her... which would be a nightmare as my alarm clock is in my actual bedroom.

I can't seem find to balance anything else with my time, no drinks with any friends, no workout with the elliptical machine that keeps me company in my family room and is seconds away from my couch... reality is I don't get a chance to make it on my couch to watch TV even; because I can't make it down the stairs from putting my daughter to bed.

I leave for work my girls still sleeping, I get home it's soon bedtime... how do you working mothers do it? Actually how do working father's do it? I feel contempt and guilt ridden, I feel like somehow there must be another way to work this out but I can't seem to be able to figure out what others might have mastered.

How do you cope?