You don't have to be a Pinterest mom!
Gina W is a 57 year old grandma who has raised 4 sons with friends coming and going over the years, 8 pets at different times, a full life of school and church volunteer work. She was what we call today, a "stay at home mom."
She had a powerful message (in my opinion) for today's moms:
Stop trying to be a Pinterest mom!
We often hear moms say/complain that they are drowning in housework. According to Gina, and many older moms, they only have themselves to blame.
Moms of today, you overextend yourselves with playdates, extravagant birthday parties and the Facebook/Instagram/Snapchat/Pinterest lifestyle. There is no need to one up anyone else. Parties and living rooms don't need to be perfect. Your one year old isn't going to care what the party decorations look like. Ask a teen or 20 something. I'm willing to bet they will tell you they not only don't remember their first birthday parties, they don't care. I had my first two babies when the internet was brand new and the second two just before MySpace. For all four, my in-laws were there, the kids had a few gifts then we set them on a trash bag on the floor, put their cake in front of them and let them have fun. There was no fanfare, no "smash cake" no posting everywhere for the world to see. All four kids turned out just fine. They love the simplicity of their pictures. They love, just the love.
The advice from the moms of yesterday to the moms of today- Get back to the basics! Simple living. Before bed every night, Gina does a "zoom cleaning." She pics up clutter (shoes, papers, folded laundry, etc), folding blankets on the couch, making sure the kitchen is tidy, the coffee maker is clean and ready to go for morning. The little things that matter. She doesn't have matching towels, a perfectly decorated bedroom or little paper cutouts sprinkled across the walls.
Don't beat yourself up because you're not perfect. It's impossible to be the perfect mom. Find joy in your children, your home and all of the messes. Every year on National Pizza Day, we buy dough from Publix. I sprinkle flour on our glass-top stove, roll out the pizza, toss it in the air (hoping I catch it), let the kids put the toppings on, slide it in the oven, then we have a flour fight. We get flour everywhere! My kids love those memories. We all help cleaning up the mess, after they toss more flour on me and each other. No Pinterest needed.
<---- my family (half of us, anyway)
<----definitely NOT my family
Some days I'll walk away from the piles of dishes, dirt and dog hair on the floor, toilets that need to be scrubbed, laundry that's swishing in the washer and take the kids downtown. We'll go to Dough Nation, get pizza at NY NY Pizza or Eddie and Sam's, walk along the Riverwalk, peer up at the skyscrapers and just live in the moment. We take silly pictures not caring about our hair, what we look like or what others will think.
If I post the pictures (okay, when), I wait until later in the evening, when the kids are in bed. I don't add any filters to the pictures. I just post them how they were taken. I might or might not have cleaned the kitchen, switched the laundry or scrubbed the toilets. I did, however, make some lasting memories that weren't planned, weren't scripted and were just as memorable and happy.
Live for you. Live for your family. Live in the moment. Enjoy today. just as it is. Be messy.
