I know, I'm really getting bad at this. Facebook has killed my blog. It's so much easier to go on there and add millions of one line status updates then to sit and write a blog post. Especially when life consists of changing diapers, chasing runny noses, and putting on snow boots again and again.
But I'm going to try, just today, no promises for tomorrow though.
Now that the postpartum depression that seems to hunt me down viciously after every baby has surrendered and I've found a desire to be again, I find myself battling the same ever present conflict. One side of me wants a career, one sides want to just be a mommy for now. Why can't I do both? Because I don't want just a baking from home a few weekends a month type of career while spending the rest of my time playing with and loving my children. I want to go to culinary school full time and get a degree in baking and pastry arts. I want to open my own shop and spend my days up to my elbows in powdered sugar and buttercream. I want to use every spare second learning more and practicing so I can have the talent for this art that I really want to have. At times I find myself searching through other peoples websites and marveling at the work they can do with sugar and I feel so mediocre. I hate feeling restricted by the money it takes to acquire all the tools, and to go to the classes, and to just be able to create something without having to have someone paying me for it so I can even afford to do it in the first place. But most of all I hate feeling so guilty for wishing the time that my children are small away so that I can have the freedom and time to explore this path. It's easy to say there will be time later and that there is a season for everything, but I hate feeling like with each day that goes by I am being left further behind in an industry that I want to be a part of so badly.
I feel like society we live in here in utah has given me such a strong divider between being a stay at home mother and having a career also. Like I can't have both and be a good mother at the same time. It's like I'm being told that if I don't choose to be home 100% of the time and devote every ounce of energy I have to these children I don't love them enough. But where is the part that says that if I don't give myself a portion of my time to devote to my interests and talents so that when my children are grown and gone I haven't lost myself, that it's okay and doesn't make me a selfish unloving person?
Idealy I want to be both. And I want to separate them so when I'm home I can be a mother and wife and when I'm working I can just work and not have to stop to change a diaper or refill a bowl of cherrios. This is what I really want, and I may have found a way to do it. I found a kitchen that I might be able to rent, it would allow me to license my business so that I could advertise more and bring in more clients. It would allow me to have a place to go where I could just work uninterrupted, and not have to do it in the middle of the night when the kids are sleeping. I could spend 2 or 3 days a week there part time and then enjoy being home the rest of them time. And I could even find a partner to work with so that I could enjoy some adult interaction at the same time. I'd have to find a babysitter of course, which makes me feel bad. And is an added expense. And the kitchen isn't free to rent, and I'd have to pay part of the utilities and more for advertising to be able to get enough business to make it even a possibility. So here I find myself again frustrated by the expense of it all. But before I find a way to finance it and get my feet off the ground here is the question. And please I need honest answers, not "I don't want to hurt your feelings" type of answers. You've seen some of the stuff that I have done so far, how do you think it compares with others that you've seen? Do I even have enough talent to make a go of this without failing miserably? There are a lot of cake decorators out there, just look on KSL and craigslist. The market is flooded with amateur decorators who will give you a cake for practically nothing. I don't want to be one of those people. I want to develop a name for myself. I want people to tell people about me when they know someone planning a wedding. I want to get good enough that one day I can be one of the best in the state and really compete, I want to be able to charge what my time is worth and not have people turn away. But most of all I want the work that I do to be special. I want people to feel like they want to get a cake from me because of who I am, not because maybe they can work me for a cheap deal.
So anyway, that's where I am right now. Wondering why I can be satisfied to just be a mother right now, but knowing that if I don't have a creative outlet that I love somewhere that I won't ever feel really satisfied with life.
I hope this doesn't come across wrong. I love my children. Love everything about them. But I love them more when I don't feel drained by the monotony of daily life at home. I am a better mother when I am a better and happier me.
My heart goes out to all the working mothers out there, what a fine balance you have to create so you don't feel like either side is getting less than it deserves. And to all those mothers out there than can devote every minute to their families and be completely fulfilled I am amazed and envious of you. I don't know how you do it.
10 comments:
Sounds like you have already made up your mind that you are going to do it. Good luck!
Kari, I hear you 100%
I am having one of those nights...Leah has been fussing all night and I feel like just sitting in the bathroom in a ball and crying my eyes out. I understand the need to have something else to accomplish other than changing diapers and feeding cheerios to kids...even though that is fun and rewarding in its own right. Since moving to Germany and living with my parents, we have not even had a space to call our own let alone another spare space to do my hobbies.
In all honesty,every time I come look at your blog I am amazed at your beautiful cakes. And I think the rent a cake thing is awesome!! That would be my dream too to have a studio separate from home where I could go a few hours a week to just do whatever, and then go back home and be a mom 100%
sorry for the long comment...to make it short, I agree and I think you could do it!!
First, I think that the most important thing you can do for yourself, and your kids,is to pray to find out what is right, and then just do it. If it is right for you to be away for a couple of hours, then that is what you need to do. If you are doing what you feel is right with the Lord, then don't worry about what others say! and sadly to say, but there probably will be some people who will give you those "you need to be a home all the time, you must be a bad mother comment. But if you are right with the Lord, just remind them that they we are all different, and just say that it's great that staying at home works for them. Besides, who are we to be the judge? You do make wonderful cakes, and if that is something you have a passion for, that passion will show.!! And if it doesn't go the way you want, you'll be better for trying!! Just know that the Lord knows and understands each of us, and we are not all on the same journey. We each have our own strengths and weakness, and we have to do the things that will make us best able to fulfill our own expectations. There are times when I want to be gone, just for a few hours, and then i go out for a few hours for a couple of nights(temple or out with the sister missionaries)and I realize what a blessing it is to be able to stay home. (for the first couple of minutes anyway!! : ) I did feel guilty for being gone, but then the kids have survived, and they develop more of a bond with Jake. Plus, Jake has gotten better with doing things while I am out, and I even get to come home to the dishes done, and dinner put away! : ) Not too bad of a trade off!! Sorry this took so long, but I really don't want you to feel like you have to do things one way or the other. Just do what is right, and the peace will come.
Thanks guys. I think for now I'm just going to get a sitter for the kids a few days a week so I can still work from home, but without any little ones under foot. Then if it works and I'm getting enough business to pay for it I'll look into another location. My next door neighbor even offered to watch them, which is great because then I'm still close by if they need me :)
Thanks for the support. And Katie won't it be amazing when the day comes that you can have a house with a studio and I can have one with a bakery?! Oh to dream :)
Just think, you could live by us:
http://www.jwu.edu/college.aspx?id=19510
I remember trying to figure out what to do when most of the kids were in school and we needed the money. The daycare worked for me for a while, but then it was time for some adult contact. I chose working for the school district so I could have the same schedule the kids did. It has worked for over 22 years now. You must do what works for you and your situation. Nobody else knows what YOU need. NO regrets then.
Kari - this is probably the most important post I've ever seen anybody post. I've heard the same thing expressed by many women - and especially in my own discipline. All I can tell you, from the standpoint of being through my 5th decade on the planet, is that you don't have much time with your kids in life. And those years under five years old are the (I'm saying this from the standpoint of reading in the science of brain development) THE most important of all - a child lays down the patterns of their brain wiring in these years - the complexity of that pattern, and the basic shape of it take form in a way that will never be duplicated in the child's life.
Actually, there are some things if, not learned in the first year of the formation of that brain wiring, can NEVER be learned. I can explain that if you want to know.
The wiring continues to expand after that till about age eleven, when the brain begins to re-write itself and then the brain actually shrinks, and wiring that had not been used simply dissolves. This process continues till about age 24, which is closer to the true end of adolescence.
In other words, if you want a hand in forming the mind, the expectations, the foundations concepts and behaviors and discipline in the boys' brains, you've got to be there. Not for quality time, but for all the time - in the least "significant" moments of life, we become ourselves. Not in the quality moments.
I'm telling you this because i had to make this same decision. And further, I have recently learned that your life - the things you wanted to do, the talents and projects you put on hold in this tiny slip of time that the kids are small - all of those things come rolling, roaring, flooding back when they are gone - and your time fills up and you do tons and tons and tons of the things that have been waiting.
This is what I learned: the forming of the kids' minds and hearts was the single most interesting, challenging, important, up to my elbows artistic project of MY ENTIRE LIFE. Nothing I have ever done - none of the travel, none of the schooling - the awards, the small fame and recognition - none of it has any significance when I compare it to that masterpiece work that used every talent I had, every resource in my brain and soul.
And when I look at the kids who have become my best friends, at their lives and their choices as adults - their strength, their wisdom and humor, their work ethic - and the respect they have earned from the people who know them and work with them, I know that every second of putting my little talents on hold was worth it.
I am not telling you what to do. I am telling you what I have learned from the one life I have been given - the life I have almost used all the way up. I know where I invested what I have been given - and it blesses my life every day, and will bless my being for as long as I exist.
By the way. Love the cake. Love it.
Thanks for the thoughts everyone. I appreciate the words of advise. And K I agree with you whole heartedly that nothing I can do will be as great as the work I'm doing with my boys. When Aaron was just finishing school and I was talking to my boss about leaving my manager job at Harmons. I remember her telling me what a good job she thought I did and that she wished I would reconsider. And I remember telling her that I could always get another job somewhere else later on and be just as good at it. But that if I messed up this job, raising my boys, that I would never get another chance. And for that reason I needed to be there for them more than working full time allowed me to do.
I think that's why I battle with this so much. I didn't like that job. Yes it gave us the much needed money and insurance that we needed at the time so I did it. But when the time came that I could leave I was more than happy. But then I found this. Cakes. Something that I could do that I seemed to be good at. And other people acknowledged that i was good at it. I'd never really had anything like that before. Not that I enjoyed so much. But then I found myself wanting to do it all the time and my kids getting pushed aside. I was there, but only in body. I don't want to give either up, but I know I need to be more present for my boys. So I'm feeling good about the solution I've made for the time being. If I can work a few hours a week while they play somewhere else, or are at school, then I can focus on what I need to do. And then when they come home I've had the time I needed and I can focus on them. No more trying to do it all at the same time :) And if it doesn't work out and I need to cut back I can do that and no have regrets about not trying it :) It sure was nice taking a break most of this last year. I just try to keep telling myself that the time will come. If I can just do enough here and there to keep up my skills and learn new techniques then when my time comes I will be ready :)
I agree with what you have decided and I think you can make it work. It won't be easy but you won't regret choosing the kids over a career. When the time is right all those skills will come back and maybe you will be blessed with even more. Those cute little boys need their mom and as their grandmother I can think of no one that can fill that role but you. They are so sweet that I just want to cry when I hug and hold them. They are so precious and they really do grow up fast. You just can't imagine it right now but it goes by in such a flash and before you know it you will be fifty and wonder where the time went. I know it doesn't make the day to day stuff any easier but it is true. You are a great mom and those little boys are very lucky. I love you and am proud of you.
Once a woman in our ward - a really wonderful woman who was a grammar school teacher, and single - I sang a Halloween song I'd made up for the kids to her, and she said, "You're wasting your talents staying home like this. You should be influencing tons of kids." All I could do is look at her in amazement, that something so obvious and huge to me - my kids - would be so invisible to her. She had no way of understanding the iron bond that happens between a kid and the dedicated and full time - forever caregiver. I still wonder at that. But I smiled and thanked her for what she meant to say.
Wasting my talents.
Wow.
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