It's Just Not Me

I'm not going to even begin this post with, "Oh my goodness, it's been almost a month (again) since I've posted," but I guess I just did. It's the holiday season. That has to count for something?

Speaking of holiday season, there are a lot of cute crafts and creative project going on around me. As I peruse through Facebook and mom sites and talk with friends, it seems that everyone has their children doing something fun and creative.

That's just not me.

Is there something that other moms do that you wish that you could do or be better at? For me, it's crafting. Believe me, there are plenty of more things I could name, but I'm just going to go with crafting for now.

For instance, I just saw an adorable little painting of a Rudolph done with a foot print.

First of all, I would never end up with a footprint from either of my boys. I would end up with a painted footprint trail all over my house. Kind of like the trail of crayon scribbles I came across going from my kitchen floor to my living room floor this evening (I was cooking dinner while this one happened).

Then I have some friends that go to a pottery place every month and make these adorable little pottery pieces. I sometimes daydream of what this might be like to bring my boys in and have them sit and paint a creative creation.

Only, I am brought back to reality knowing that I could probably end up paying for many broken pieces in the shop. Thus, I have no adorable, precious hand-painted pottery pieces to call my own.

Now, there may be hope for Oliver yet. He seems to like to color. He's the one who decorated my floor. Evan has yet to ever attempt coloring on anything except paper, and that only lasts about 30 seconds before he's done.

I'm just not crafty. Do I feel like my boys are missing out on stimulating this creative part of their brain? Yes, I often have bouts of guilt about this. However, I do bake and cook. I bake a lot. And that makes me feel better about the whole creative part...sometimes.

Evan and I bake cookies, breads, cakes and other desserts together. He helps me with pancakes and waffles or muffins. I know it's really not the same, but I pretend it is.

I know that there are so many moms out there who feel guilty about not being the "crafty mom" or the "soccer mom" or the "non-yelling mom" or the "baby-wearing mom." But you know what? It really is OK.

We all have our strengths and abilities, and our kids will benefit from what we do have.

I'm just glad that Evan is in school now, no matter how short it is, so that I can have some crafty things hanging on my refrigerator now. Hooray!

Oh, and another thing that's just not me. I'm not the mom who's children always look put together.

We went to see Santa today, and although the boys weren't perfectly buttoned up with the cleanest faces, it went much better that expected.

Now, the woman behind me with the 9 children ages 2-3 had her brood looking in tip-top form. She must have been a teacher or a child care provider.

All of the children, ALL, had on matching Santa hats and did not stray from her site for a second. None of them were running around; none of them were yelling; none of them were picking their noses.

I turned to her and said, "Wow, I can't believe they are all keeping their hats on?! And they are so well-behaved!"

"I'm surprised too, and we do take a lot of outings together," was her reply.

Somehow, I don't think it would matter how often I took Evan and Oliver out, they would still have something out of place and "act up" at some point.

It was all I could do to wipe the cracker crumbs from Oliver's mouth and brush the crumbs off of Evan's shirt and get Oliver to sit on Santa's lap.

The result was the classic visit Santa photo of one of the children crying and the other looking like a deer in the headlights.

It's a memory.

I know I kind of always end my posts with, "If there's any mom who feels...", but the thing is, this blog is for other moms to relate to and hopefully make feel better. Because whether we're that crafty mom or not, we all have days where we just feel, well, meh.

I just have a lot of those muddled days, but I wouldn't change them for anything. Honestly I wouldn't.