I have attended several meetings over the past two weeks, all attended by other mothers. As I look back (and forward to many, many more) it makes me laugh. One meeting was of the three of us who lead the children's program (Primary) at our church. I have 4 kids, another has 3 boys (the same age as mine) and the third has 2 daycare kids.
Trying to organize just getting to the meeting went something like this, in an email chain:
- I can do Thursday or Friday morning.
- I can't do Thursday, I have to take the kids to something. Let's do Friday.
- Can we do my house so that the baby can get in her morning nap?
- If it's Friday I don't have the car, but I can put all the kids in the stroller and walk to the church
- My 3 year old will be able to escape from the church because we can't lock him into one area.
- I can pick you up and drive to someone's house
- If you don't have a car, let's do it at your place
- I don't have baby gates anymore, but I'll ask around and try to get the place baby proof
- I'll make sure to bring snacks to keep the 7 children quiet while we try to meet.
Seriously, this is the conversation I seem to have every time I have a meeting.
This week my sister-in-law and I have been working on a presentation for the family company. By the end of the week it will have meant 4 mornings trying to make our 2 and 3 year olds get along and not get tired of each other, plus trying to bounce the baby, or get her to sleep. It means getting the kids snacks or letting them finish off all the cereal from nearly empty boxes. It means over an hour trying to clean up from the free-for-all mess that kept them busy. It meant 4 clean ups because I'm also trying to toilet train and I kept getting distracted with the work I was trying to do.
Seriously, when this presentation goes off, people will see a slick, well-thought out presentation. What they won't see is how amazing it is given the work environment circumstances!
When I was at that Primary meeting last week, I joked to the other moms "Can you imagine our husbands arranging and having a meeting like this?" Nope - they just say they want to have a meeting and off they go. Totally a "mars and venus" separate worlds scenario!
1 comment:
I keep thinking of the difference in productivity between moms trying to get stuff done with kids around and dads trying to accomplish the same thing. And whose cooler heads would prevail lol. They could do it if they had to on a regular basis like us, they've just never had the opportunity to practice managing that kind of organized chaos.
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