The Spring Break Spiral

Hi friends welcome back or to Moms at work a podcast/blog for moms who work! You may be asking yourself, but what KIND of work do I need to do to be here Jeanette?! I am glad you asked, and I am glad you are here. Let’s clarify working moms, do you have a job that you do or go to everyday? Then YAY! You belong here. Do you have a job that you do from your house?! Then YAY you belong here. Are you working on a side hustle,  are you home schooling your kids, or are you an entrepreneur who works from her kitchen table?! Then YAY you belong here!

If you are a mom, stepmom, bonus mom, mom who has adopted, single mom, or even an almost mom then your in the right place, here we are breaking down stigmas, and walls that tend to keep us trapped in the chaos of guilt and shame for working or even, gasp…liking our jobs!

This is a place for us to bounce ideas off of one another, learn and grow together. Sometimes we will talk about the bible, we have learned about the proverbs 31 woman and what we can learn from her and what we needed to cast off. Sometimes we will be joined by a friend of mine who can teach us something!

Today I am going to be giving you tips and tricks on how to not feel guilty when your kids are home from school like spring break, any crazy holiday they get off, summer, fall break and Christmas break. Come on, lets’ get to work!

I don’t know about you but anytime my kids have time off of school I feel the need to either, entertain them like I am a cruise ship director, or go on a trip or I just give up because its too much pressure and they live on screens for the week or day.

Then the guilt and shame sink in. Here’s a peek into my brain and what i have been calling the SPRING BREAK SPIRAL

“OK- kids are off for the week, let me check my calendar and see what is on my calendar that I HAVE to do. Should we go on a trip? Maybe go camping? I can work from the camper, maybe a little beach trip. No we don’t need to do that, let’s save that for summer. What about just a day trip? We could go for the day it would be fun and fast and memorable. No I don’t really have a full day where we could swing that and those gas prices. Ok. Well lets talk to friends and see about hanging out with people. But we can do that last minute. Ah I want them to have fun, but I don’t have time to entertain them. They are big and they will think a day to screens is fine, they won’t complain. But what if all they remember from their spring break is me working and them being bored. I will hate that for them. Should we go on a trip? What is something fun we can cook?”

This is my brain spiraling. There is no trip planned. There will be boredom. There will be last minute hang outs with friends and there is a TON of work I need to do. All of this is ok!

I just want to start by give us all a little freedom here. It is good for our kids to see us working. My mom worked when I was little. She had a 9-5 office job…can we cue up dolly! And We spent a lot of time at home alone. I didn’t hate. It. I saw her leave in the morning and i saw her come back. I knew she worked hard for our family and thats that! It’s as easy as that and I don’t remember seeing her feel guilty about it.

Nowadays,. How old do I sound, some of us have the luxury of working form home. Now when the kids are around there is a layer of difficulty but its not all bad! Our kids can literally see us working. And sometimes I try to invite them in. My job is weird so I will let my boys sit with me while i edit and I teach them what I do. They have popped into many a zoom call and then there was a day I yelled, NOT ON MUTE WITHOUT EVEN THINKING! “Don’t come over here, you don’t have pants on and I’m on a zoom call!” I was later told that was “SO NOT COOL!”

My point is this. My kids know I work. I can’t and don’t try to hide it from them, neither should you. I also show them what my paychecks pay for! Thats kinda fun! They can see the benefit of mom. It’s not just doing this for my own gain but for theirs too. 

So, it’s good for them to see us doing this. It’s also really fun to dream with your kids. To be honest. I didn’t know I was allowed to dream as a mom. I thought whatever I did or didn’t do was just that.. I would live in this family with a stable job, reliable schedule and badda bing batta boom that was it! It wasn’t until like 6 years ago that I realized I could dream of something different and chase it down. I have included my kids in each stage. It’s actually really rewarding to share this with them.

So a quick reminder my kids are 15, 13 and 11. But I have been doing this job for 4 years. So yes its fun to include them now while they are asking better questions and looking at their own career paths. I was actively showing them my job when they were little. I was showing them what I was dreaming of when they were little. I wanted them to know and to understand why I was pulling back sometimes! Or why there was times I was sitting in my office alone.

Now back to the spiraling. What can we do when we cant fully entertain our people?

How can we make memories without going full out on a trip, or we only have a few stolen hours a day!

Here are some tips or ideas!

Make a fun lunch, and eat at the park. Pack it up in a basket and go play! Get outside! And DO YOUR BEST TO UNPLUG FROM WORK. I know it’s hard. I know it seems impossible but the most gut wrenching thing happened to me a few weeks ago. I was at the gym with my middle kiddo and my phone was blowing up with work stuff. IT COULD WAIT. I am not the president of the united states and pushing these texts and emails off an hour was going to be ok but I couldn’t. I grabbed my phone and instead of being fulling engaged in the warm up I was texting back and my sweet Titus said, “Mom you are being rude to our coach. You need to put your phone away. Whatever it is can wait!”

OUCH MAN! He was so right. He was respectful to me and to our coach. It was something I would have said to him so I want to encourage you. Pull back for an hour. PLAY get outside and have a fun with your kids! They will see you pulling back for them and may pull back for you in the future.

Heres a good question, Can you manipulate your schedule at all? I can, so I am making a mess of my Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday in order to have Thursday all the way off. I want to play I want to swim and i want to rest with my people. So thats something i am doing. Is it currently 7:30 Monday night as I record this…YES I TOLD YOU MY WEEK IS A MESS!! But here I am pulling together so I can have a day with my family.

What events can you sign them up for? Use these VBS or church camps to let them go have fun, and allow you to HUSTLE and get things done! Again it’s 7:30 and my kids are at at church sports camp! The little one is playing, the middle one is serving and the oldest is bigger so he’s out with his buddies! DO NOT LET shame or guilt creep in about your kids going out to activities like this. Vet the events and the leaders and then let them play. I am a big fan of having other people speak into our kids lives.

Movie night! Popcorn, candy, blankets and its a party! This is one of our favorite things to do. Phones get put away and we get to chill together! Add in a pizza and you have a happy Tapley family.

Play a new game. Try a new food for dinner or a new restaurant or have your kids cook dinner! All really fun ways to connect with your crew that doesn’t take a ton of time!

Ok last thing…

I have been struggling with connecting with my daughter. Y’all hormones are a beast and I just have to be honest and tell you I have been struggling. I was talking to my best friend and she gave me some GREAT advice. She told me to make a drink, it can be whatever you want, margarita, Topo Chico and lime, Italian soda whatever, your choice and have Zoe make something too. My kids love making Italian sodas and go for a walk. Take the drinks and cruise the neighborhood. Just BE together.

This has been hard to even squeeze in but let me tell you. It’s sweet. It’s working! We both look forward to it and I think it gives her a little bit of a grown up vibe. We are just walking and chatting. 

So take some advice from my wise bestie and give this a shot!

Whatever you do or don’t do. Don’t let shame creep in. You are a good mom. You are doing a good job. If you don’t believe me, take a look at those kids. They are thriving!

And you might be scoffing at me. Like how do you know Jeanette you don’t even know my kids. 

I know this because you are here, you are listening and learning and that shows you care.

So put away that cruise director hat and go grab some sparkling water and some fancy syrup (you can get this at TJ MAXX, HomeGoods or even Walmart!) ! Here is my favorite Italian soda recipe! go make some!

Y’all its the little things! Don’t stress. Be present when you can and give some extra snuggles, shoot let them stay up 10 extra minutes! These are the things that make for sweet memories!

Email me at itstimeforcoffeepodcast@gmail.com. Click here if you want to join the email community!