Unlike with money, and unfortunately, there is no such thing as a savings account for your time.

Some days I choose to spend it on cleaning. Some days I choose to spend it on napping. Some days I choose to spend it by giving myself manicures.

I do not feel guilty for sometimes spending my precious nap time (aka, allowance) on doing my nails. To be honest it's really nice to look down at my hands mid-diaper change or during a bottle washing session and admire at least ONE nice feature of mine - because no doubt I'm covered in spit-up and desperately hoping I will be able to work in a shower that day...

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Housewives can have it rough. I'm not complaining, just stating the truth. I love my job. I won't say I love when my husband is walking out the door in the morning, freshly showered, wearing his nice white-collar work clothes, headed out to talk to adults all day. I watch him leave--I, seated at the couch breastfeeding, with tattered pajamas, no make up, and bed head--feeling like a total frump and wishing I could at least have a chance to make myself look presentable in case the FedEx man comes today.

I'm getting better. Violet is now 5 weeks old, together we are learning how to get more done. In the morning when she's done eating I hand her off to Justin {I don't even bother asking him if he minds taking her for a bit, he's their dad and he can spend time with them, too....he never complains about it, either } to burp her and entertain her so that I can either preen myself or sleep a little bit longer.

In complete truth, I feel very privileged to be a stay-at-home-mother. My feathers get all ruffled when people suggest {or just state bluntly} how stay at home mothers have it easy. Ignorance. {I will not turn this into a rant post, I will rise above!}

But I am in that season of life when many of my friends and acquaintances are also starting families. So I see the posts on Facebook, 6-8 weeks after a new mother has given birth she will say how difficult it will be to drop her baby off at day care and go back to work. These posts just make me so sad! I realize many mothers prefer to keep their careers after having kids, but I also know, not all of them would chose to stay at their jobs rather than be with their babies if they didn't need to. Either way, it's hard to leave your baby!

Leave my Violet and head to work after just 6 weeks?! Excuse me while I go hug her hard...

I am so grateful the Lord has given us the desire, the strength and the means to keep our babies at home with their mother. Not only do I believe it's ideal for young children and infants to be with their mothers, I just don't know if I'd be able to cope with another person "getting to" be with my pies all day if I had to return to work full time. In that respect, I consider it a privilege.

Not easy, not by any means is it easy... but still a blessing.

I've never been one for employment. Money is not important enough to me to make it worth it, and I'm a homebody. I don't look forward to getting away via a job. I am not concerned with my achievements in the workplace, it's just not a place where I am motivated. That's just not who I am. Ever since I was a little girl, my desire was to be a mother. It might not sound exciting, and you can call me crazy for preferring it over some high-powered career, but by-golly, I'm passionate about it.

Natalie Portman was recently criticized for calling motherhood the "most important role of her life" in her acceptance speech at the Oscars. I get her...


Unfortunately, not everyone does. 


"But is motherhood really a greater role than being secretary of state or a justice on the Supreme Court?" asked her attacker on Salon.com. 


{Rolls eyes.} Obviously it is to Natalie, so how abouts let's just let her decide her priorities in life, shall we?

How pathetic and sad is it that a woman is criticized publicly for proclaiming that she feels motherhood her most important role? As if Hilary Clinton, if asked, would state that her political career was obviously more important than being a mother to Chelsea? I doubt it. This is what I mean by privilege. One can work their butt off towards their career goals, but being a mother is a God-given calling, a privilege. It cannot be equated with a job.

I really do find joy in keeping house and child-rearing, I consider it a God given desire. A vocation. I have been called. Today's society is growing more unfamiliar and unappreciative with the art {and value} of being a wife and mother, in my honest opinion. Radical feminist, Simone de Beauvoir, may have called me a "parasite" and might have told me I was not allowed to stay home with my babies - but I don't care what she {or anyone else} thinks, because I'm happy with this "career". I'm proud of my work. I care what my children think of me, as their mother I'm responsible for helping to grow their self-worth. And I care what my God thinks of me. Sorry, Ms. Beauvoir. I don't care what you think of me. 

This work here, raising my Pies, this is important business.