Honey, honey doing committee work for anything doesn't say a thing about whether you are good mother or not. Hell my kids didn't learn to brush their hair until they were teenagers. =P
I have been a most unconventional mother in many ways. I let my kids play hooky from school, let them sleep in their clothes, didn't make them clean up after themselves, and should have thumped them every time they talked back at me. lol Sometimes I look back and I think 'wtf was I thinking spending all that volunteer time when I could have been playing with the boys??!!!!"
See now they are grown (nearly all of them) and they don't give a flitter about hanging with mom. It makes me sad sometimes. I missed a lot of time I could have spent with them, in the days of mommy worship. John has entered that stage of argumentativeness. I hate this stage in kids. He has to argue every single thing no matter how ridiculous. It is in them, part of the hell of puberty...but sheese.
Yesterday we went to Wally to get a poster board for a project for health class. Not a problem at all. I saw these cool cut out sticker letters and some cool markers and mentioned he might want to get those too. Oh no, you would have thought I told him he had to wear a dress and pigtails the way he carried on. I finally just had to walk away following the last argument of "I hate markers and want to use a regular pencil and stencils".....errrrmmm okie dokey whateva! *rolled my eyes till they hurt*
Since this is my third at the hell phase, it is not new. But it saddens me that my last baby is leaving the 'mommy is the bestest' stage. Instead I am now entering 'parents are annoying' stage. *tear*
I will be grand again when he hits that "I want to learn to drive" stage.
The very best mother type thing I think I ever did was give my kids hooky days. It started with Ed when he started school. You see I was notorious for playing hooky when I was in high school. Before the days of limited absences, if you made the grades they didn't say much at all. So I played hooky all the time. In one semester alone I missed 28 days. LMAO I partied, went swimming, played all day basically. There were always people somewhere also playing hooky so it wasn't hard to find things to keep busy for the day. Even before I had a ride, I would just catch the bus to school and be back in time to catch it home. hehe. I was not a good child in school...not at all. So when Ed started school I could hear the echo of my mother's wails at me "you will have a child like you someday!!"
Well of course I had to prove her wrong. ;) So what did I do? I gave my kids three hooky days a year each school year. They could pick the days anytime, they had to plan for it at least a day ahead. Other than that it was their choice. If they wanted to lay in bed all day they could, if they wanted to watch tv all day they could. I was cool with pretty much whatever. They loved it!! It made them feel like they controlled their lives a wee bit. And guess what?? Never once did Ed or Matt ever play hooky from school.
Amazing how well it worked in fact. Anyway we still do it today with John. Three days a year, and you know what? Last year John didn't even take his. (It would mean missing orchestra class, lol).
What makes me think it was a cool mom thing? To this day I hear the boys telling their friends about how "cool" it was to have hooky days. And invariably I hear friends say "wow I wish my mom would do that". Now that makes me glow. =)
Nah Janet, committee and volunteer work does not a great mother make!! I wish I had spent that time genuinely playing with my kids. But I like to volunteer, to think I am helping our lives by volunteering....though I did come to think much of it was just an illusion. *sigh* These days I just volunteer to stack chair and music stands in orchestra. LOL A no brainer!!! ;)
Hugs,
~Ami
xoxox
