Today I was in a conversation with someone about the election and she said, regarding Trump, “He’s not perfect, but he’s our only choice.” Truthfully, who is? Is anyone “perfect”? It seems to me that no one is the perfect candidate, the perfect student, the perfect golfer, or the perfect parent. So why are we always trying to appear that way? And why are we demanding perfection in our leaders? Isn’t it better to acknowledge that we fail? That we aren’t perfect and that most likely our kids (and our country) are going to be fine in spite of our imperfections? In the spirit of acknowledging how imperfect we all are, here are the things I do that make me an imperfect mom.
5. I don’t make breakfast
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One of our amazing writers at PJ Media, Rhonda Robinson, is a homeschooling mom like me and she has raised nine kids and she shared with me once that she always made sure she was up at the crack of dawn to make her children a lovely, hot breakfast.
Crap.
If I get the waffles in the toaster it’s a win. I actually once gave my children frozen waffles as we ran out the door one morning late for something or other. For real. Frozen solid. They lived. Most days I let them eat junk cereal or cinnamon toast or whatever they are capable of making. Pancakes are for Saturdays. I would sure like to be up at dawn cooking up eggs and bacon and French toast, but let’s get real. It’s just not who I am. So I taught my ten-year-old how to cook and yesterday morning I woke up to two dozen cupcakes and a pan of brownies. Score!
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4. Baths
Don’t ask my 7-year-old when the last bath she had was. She will say “186 days ago.” And while we are still working on numbers and that is a slight exaggeration, baths seem to get shoved to the wayside around here. During the summer they swim every day and they pretty much always smell clean (like bleach and chlorine). In the winter it’s not that I don’t want them to bathe, it’s just that I forget until after they’re in bed and I think…when did they bathe? Tomorrow. We’ll do it tomorrow. And then tomorrow, the baby gets sick, the dog pukes on the carpet, and no one remembers baths. This morning I made them shower because I couldn’t get a comb through their hair. This does not make me feel great about my mothering skills.
3. Frozen Pizza
Most of the time I’m on the ball where dinner is concerned. I like to do freezer meals ahead of time so I always have something to throw in the crockpot. But sometimes I forget to even put the dinner in the crockpot and when that happens it’s frozen pizza time. The kids don’t care. They love it. But inside I’m thinking, will my husband notice this is the third pizza this week? Luckily, he’s too tired to really care and so far he hasn’t said anything.
2. Grocery Shopping
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I’m like Old Mother Hubbard. My cupboards are bare but it isn’t poverty, it’s that I can’t get to the grocery store regularly. Snacks in my house lately consist of Ramen noodles or a wilting carrot. What do you mean you don’t like baker’s chocolate? It’s what we have! Now sit down and enjoy your ketchup packet.
1. Political Faux Pas
We don’t much like Hillary Clinton over here so the kids have overheard their fair share of political opinions, even though we try to keep it away from them. But if you’re out somewhere and you hear a kid loudly proclaim, “Hillary Clinton lies and Obama takes Grampa’s money,” I’m pretty sure those are my kids. Sorry. We try to explain that politics aren’t polite conversation, but they have no filter, usually leaving me red-faced in the grocery line (when I get the energy to go).
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