Surviving At Home

As promised in this post, I’m sharing some link love with two awesome work at home moms who were kind enough to help me reach my Top Spots threshold so I can get paid!

Nell Taliercio is the awesome mom behind Causal Friday Everyday. This is Nell’s “mom blog” where she shares her tales of motherhood in her very beautiful style of writing. Visiting her blog is a real treat because not only do I love the colors of her theme but every post she writes is so heartfelt.

Mama’s Time Out is a support community and social network for mothers of all ages. They have a weekly internet radio show about motherhood topics on Sunday afternoons and each member gets their own web page and is able to write blog posts. You can also go visiting other pages, make friends, and post pictures.

Thanks so much for helping me get paid, ladies! I’ll be stopping by soon

And when did we Americans get so judgemental?

I absolutely hate to talk politics but every time I hear somebody passing judgement on Sarah Palin I just cringe and think, “Where do we get off criticizing her?” Who are WE to say whether she has made a good decision by accepting the VP nomination?

As an American woman (and my party affiliation is of no matter), I am insulted to my bones at the scrutiny Sarah Palin has endured. Sure, she is a public figure, an elected official, so she opened herself up for this. I guess I can understand that we the people need to know more about her if she’s going to hold the 2nd highest elected position in the country. I get that.

But these are the things that are driving me absolutely bonkers whenever I hear a news program or a supposedly intelligent reporter spouting words of opinion rather than of objectivity…

• Palin’s daughter is pregnant. OK…so what? It’s by no means an ideal situation and her life will forever be changed but what does that have to do with Palin’s ability to serve as VP? It doesn’t. Her daughter is the one who made that decision and now has to live with the consequences. And this situation is difficult enough without the media speculating whether it’s good or bad for her to marry her boyfriend. Let it be her decision!

• Many people are also appalled that Palin’s pregnant daughter attended the convention. So? Why deprive her daughter of witnessing history and sharing this remarkable event with her mother and family? We are far past the days of shipping our pregnant teens off to a “long lost relative,” only to have them return from their “vacation” after a few months, seemingly unchanged. If anything, teen pregnancy is often glorified or made to seem easier than it actually is. Why was the movie Juno such a huge hit?

• Many people also claim that Palin shoved her daughter into the spotlight because of this issue. Well, if she didn’t make the announcement, certainly the Democrats would have found great pride in announcing it and shoving her into the spotlight. I’m still not sure why this is news but better to be acknowledged than hidden away like a deep, dark secret.

• Just how many reporters and columnists are going to write that Palin is a bad role model or a neglectful mother for accepting this position? Hello??? What better role model could you get of a strong, intelligent woman who has been married for a long time, seems to have a happy and supportive family, and who is eager to accept this chance of a lifetime to serve her country?

Last I heard Palin’s husband was quitting his job to be a stay at home dad if McCain/Palin win the election. How awesome!! How wonderful to see the gender roles changed! So Mr. Palin will become the primary caregiver; how fabulous that he will get to forge a closer relationship with all of his children.

And I won’t even pretend to fully understand just how busy Sarah Palin will be if they win this election but I highly doubt she’ll be MIA from her family’s lives for four years. Yes, she’ll travel a lot more but so long as her kids are with her husband or grandparents instead of a slew of uncaring nannies, so what? With the current internet technologies she can easily call them or set up a webcam to say goodnight. Is that ideal? No, nothing will replace the feel of hugging your children tightly, but she’s also not getting shipped off to Siberia for four years.

John F. Kennedy had two small children when he was elected into office. Was he criticized just as badly? Was he considered a bad role model because he would be too busy being President to be a good father? I don’t know the answer but something tells me those questions never arose. Why not? Because he was a man and had his wife to take care of the kids?

The biggest puzzlement to me is why no women’s groups or feminist groups have stepped up in defense of Palin. Isn’t Palin the epitomy of what the women’s movement was all about? Women are just as good and qualified as men in all jobs; women can have both family and career. Hello? Don’t these groups see that the media is helping to take us back to a time where women were supposed to be barefoot and pregnant? Or are they willing to accept this setback because Palin is not a liberal Democrat? Because she’s not Hillary?

How pitiful.

I truly admire creative people. You know the type…they have an eye for putting colors and patterns together that look amazing; they can paint or draw; or they can come up with a very cool business idea and make it come to life.

Unfortunately, I am not one of those creative people…

I am more crafty than creative. I can read the directions of a crafting project and make the finished piece look just like the picture. But don’t ask me to come up with an original craft idea. Even when I was little and my brothers were making creative monstrosities out of legos, I was the one looking for the printed directions for building a house.

Not very creative!

When I was in college, I think my junior year, I needed an elective and found an Art For Non-Art Majors class. It sounded interesting and I figured, hey, how difficult could it be if it’s for “non art majors?”

Well, what I didn’t know was that “non-art majors” was really secret code that meant “artists not yet admitted into the art school.” So imagine my surprise when our first projects were handed in. I felt like I was a kindergartener who time traveled into the future and woke up in a college classroom.

Luckily there was another poor soul who had the same misunderstanding I did so we decided to laugh about it and just do our best. We were having fun even if the teacher glared at our final compositions.

But I’ll always remember during my final portfolio review (of which I was SO proud that my self-portrait actually looked like me!!) my professor looked over my projects and asked me, quite seriously, “You’re not thinking of pursuing art as a career, are you?”

I kid you not.

Luckily I was able to laugh and told him no but geez…I would have been crushed had I wanted to be a designer of some sort.

So now I take comfort in my counted cross stitch kits and follow the printed directions which give me beautiful works of art. I’ve made each of my daughters a birth sampler plus I have some other larger and more complicated samplers scattered around my house (and lets not forget about all the unfinished projects I have in various corners of the house). I love having my hands busy doing something and, if I do say so myself, my work is excellent

To discover even more Artsy Mamas, visit Mom’s Talk Network for a list of links!

WooHoo!! I have been looking forward to this event for a couple of weeks now! If you haven’t done so yet, go check out Mommyfest 2008 for fun contests, great interviews, and a chance to meet other moms online!

If it’s your first time to my blog, welcome! I’m Christina, mom of two wonderful girls and a cute but rambunctious puppy. I’m also a wife and WAHM who’s trying to make a full-time salary by working for myself rather than getting a J-O-B and working for someone else.

This is pretty much where I ramble about stuff…nothing in particular most days, just regular things that only moms would understand or appreciate. I’ll be writing more now since school is almost out and I like to share the different activities that I do with the kids during the summer. Would love to swap ideas with other moms who need to keep the kids busy during the summer months

Looking forward to meeting more of you!