Monthly Archives: January 2016

Husband = Slacker or Partner?

A while ago, my husband sent me a link to a fascinating article (take a moment to read it, I’ll wait): Maximize Earning Potential by Marrying a Slacker

I had mixed reactions when I read it too.

  1. I know my husband’s contributions to our family and household are made possible by a less demanding job than my own at the moment – consistent with the outcome of the study.
  2. I know there have been times in our marriage where roles were reversed.
  3. I know that my husband works extremely hard at his job.
  4. I know household work and child care are no less of a job, and frankly the latter is often more of a job than any corporate job I’ve ever had.

But after reading this, the thing it reinforced for me most, the thing I KNOW is…

My husband is NO SLACKER!

We are partners. Always have been, always will be. We are connected. We sense when one of us needs some slack. We dive in when the other needs support.

Why is it that we still feel the need to make one person in a marriage out to be less than?

Are we still critical of working moms?

Watching The Intern with Anne Hathaway recently, I was delighted to see a character that I could relate to. She’s a perfectionist, driven by her own passion for her work and family. While I found the need to create conflict between her and her husband unfortunate, if you overlook this, I think I’ve finally watched a working mom movie I can endorse.

The character, she was real. When she committed to something at work, it got done, and done with high quality. When she committed to her family, she was there for them.

In one scene, she is dropping her young daughter off at school and is greeted by two moms. They ask her about bringing guacamole to a party at school a following Friday, and chide her by telling her she could buy it since she’s so busy. She retorts there is no need, she’ll make it. When she re-enters her car, she says, “God, taking the high road is exhausting. It’s 2015, are we really still critical of working moms? Seriously? Still?”

Amen. And yes, unfortunately, we are, but hopefully if we can keep portraying the reality of working moms, we love our jobs and our kids, maybe we can change that.

Thank you, Anne Hathaway, for a great movie. Made my Friday night!

Are there other good working mom movies I should watch?

Traditions – birthdays together

I decided the day my first son was born that I would spend each of his birthdays with him. Then a couple years later, his brother was born, and a couple years later, the third of my amazing sons joined our family. And each year, I mark their 3 birthdays on my work calendar as Out-Of-Office. This year will mark the 12th year of this tradition, spending their birthdays with them, and I would not trade it for the world. We don’t have to do anything big. Mostly we drop the brothers off at school, then we have a morning activity typically, the Children’s Museum, Aquarium, etc., a lunch out at one of their favorite restaurants, and just spend time together. It won’t be long before my sons have more to say about how they spend their birthdays, but it warmed my heart just yesterday to hear my son whose birthday is only a couple weeks away say “yeah! I get to stay home with mom on that day” because his birthday falls on a school day. For now, we choose to spend their birthdays together. I hope when they are older and I am old, we can maintain this wonderful tradition. I’ll go wherever they are, though I may need more time off.

What special tradition do you have with your children?