The saying that begins, "It takes a village..." rings in my head constantly now that I have two children. Well, that along with the stories of my mother raising two small children while stranded in a house in Minot ND when it was 50 below. Or Kevin's mother and her story of the Ohio roads that were too dangerous to drive with kiddies in tow. And with the possibility of Kevin traveling for work in the near future, I find myself thinking: What are people thinking when they have kids and try to raise them on their own?!?
Now that the child:parent ratio in our house is 1:1, things get hairy easily. (Let's not even delve into the problems that I encounter when the kiddos outnumber me while Kevin is at work.) I don't have enough hands (or time) to keep everyone clean, feed, and happy all the time. Usually it's my needs that give first--"Today I have to choose between: taking a shower, eating 3 meals, or going to the bathroom by myself, which will it be?" It makes the idea of living near grandparents, or moving to a country where villages pull together to help care for small children (even if they don't have running water) seem like a swell idea.
So, you may ask, why not hire help? To which I answer: Have you priced baby sitters lately?!?
If I have to pay the teenager down the block $10/hr so my kids are alive when I return, I've barely got cash left over to justify spending on leaving the house in the first place. Let's not even get into the price of nannies--we are living on one income for the time being.
We had a friend babysit for us during the month of December on four separate occasions. I felt like I was in heaven. She didn't charge us anything, and the children were happy, fed,bathed, and usually asleep when we returned. Now that we have two kids, finding babysitting help is much harder--if it takes both of us to wrangle the children, we feel badly asking any ONE person to take over the task for us. And now that we don't have the time/money/energy to see our friends as much socially, we feel badly asking them to babysit for us. "Hey, we haven't seen you guys in a few months, but can you come watch our kids so we can get out of the house?" It just seems like we're taking advantage.
So, here's to hoping that as the girls grow we find some good, cheap, babysitters, or I may forgo running water and find a nice village.
Now that the child:parent ratio in our house is 1:1, things get hairy easily. (Let's not even delve into the problems that I encounter when the kiddos outnumber me while Kevin is at work.) I don't have enough hands (or time) to keep everyone clean, feed, and happy all the time. Usually it's my needs that give first--"Today I have to choose between: taking a shower, eating 3 meals, or going to the bathroom by myself, which will it be?" It makes the idea of living near grandparents, or moving to a country where villages pull together to help care for small children (even if they don't have running water) seem like a swell idea.
So, you may ask, why not hire help? To which I answer: Have you priced baby sitters lately?!?
If I have to pay the teenager down the block $10/hr so my kids are alive when I return, I've barely got cash left over to justify spending on leaving the house in the first place. Let's not even get into the price of nannies--we are living on one income for the time being.
We had a friend babysit for us during the month of December on four separate occasions. I felt like I was in heaven. She didn't charge us anything, and the children were happy, fed,bathed, and usually asleep when we returned. Now that we have two kids, finding babysitting help is much harder--if it takes both of us to wrangle the children, we feel badly asking any ONE person to take over the task for us. And now that we don't have the time/money/energy to see our friends as much socially, we feel badly asking them to babysit for us. "Hey, we haven't seen you guys in a few months, but can you come watch our kids so we can get out of the house?" It just seems like we're taking advantage.
So, here's to hoping that as the girls grow we find some good, cheap, babysitters, or I may forgo running water and find a nice village.
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