The Television and Other "Issues"

Pip and Sprout are "into" television these past couple of days, and I have to admit that I have given in to their requests more frequently than normal.

Maybe because I know that in just a couple of weeks it will be back to our school daze routine:  no television during the week and bedtime right at 8:00.  But I still feel guilty about not "engaging" with them every minute of the weeks we have left.  Am I too selfish, too lazy, or what?  Why is it that I forget about all the things we *do* do together (our vacation to the farm, the beach, trips to the park, collecting the acorns now falling, exercising our hermit crabs, going to the pool, having playdates, trips to the craft store, reading books on the front stoop, checking out books at the library) and remember only my "failings"?  Sigh. 

Some days I feel like the kids when Pip says, "This is the best day ever."  Other times I feel a little less than a Good Mom when Sprout says, "If you died Mom, we'd still have Dad.  That would be okay because he's awesomer.  He throws us in the pool and jumps of the diving board with us."  Need I remind you, dear daughter, that I have been the ONLY mom at the pool who has gone off the diving board.  Hurumph.  And never mind that dead part.

Do you ever have these feelings - television-related or not?  

Will Try Harder

The family has been home since Tuesday, DTI (Due To Illness) and the house is rather a mess. I have not been the stellar mom that I strive to be, frantically trying to Catch Up, much to Sprout and Pip's chagrin. I may have been giving a second chance, as Major [downgraded: semi-Major] snowstorm has hit our region (hey, it is March 1st after all), and school is canceled for my wee ones. If I have off too, I Will Try Harder. I was reminded of this poem, Song for a Fifth Child from Ladies Home Journal, 1958:

Song for a Fifth Child.

Mother, O Mother, come shake out your cloth,
Empty the dustpan, poison the moth,
Hang out the washing, make up the bed,
Sew on a button and butter the bread.

Where is the mother whose house is so shocking?
She's up in the nursery, blissfully rocking.

Oh, I've grown as shiftless as Little Boy Blue,
Lullabye, rockabye, lullabye loo.
Dishes are waiting and bills are past due
Pat-a-cake, darling, and peek, peekaboo

The shopping's not done and there's nothing for stew
And out in the yard there's a hullabaloo
But I'm playing Kanga and this is my Roo
Look! Aren't his eyes the most wonderful hue?
Lullabye, rockaby lullabye loo.

The cleaning and scrubbing can wait till tomorrow
But children grow up as I've learned to my sorrow.
So quiet down cobwebs; Dust go to sleep!
I'm rocking my baby and babies don't keep.