Stay at Home Mom

This has been a childhood dream of mine. I wasn’t always a stay at home mom. If your thinking about making the change to do be one, I hope reading my story helps with that decision.

Here’s how I became a stay at home mom.

A dream is a dream, it’s healthy to dream. Dreams do come true, for me it came in the least way I expected.

I actually went back to work after my maternity leave for a complete year (in Canada). My job before my maternity leave was only contract, so I had no job to go back too. I ended maternity leave on a job hunt and thankfully got one. I worked for full year with having our son in childcare.

Here’s what happened next:

Sometimes life circumstances pushes you in a different direction, in the least way you expect.

I kept hearing over and over from family and friends, “you need to work to get that second mat leave”. Peer pressure, lots of it.

Long story short: We wanted to grow our family, we did get pregnant AND then we lost the baby at 17 weeks.

After many long months of grieving and attempting going back to work.  We made the decision for me to stay home. Since growing a family was important to us, I obviously needed to stay home.  My first pregnancy ended with a difficulty in regards to my health.

Life as a Stay at Home Mom, meant a BIG lifestyle change.

It’s a massive adjustment. We did learn I wasn’t really making any money with working and having a child in daycare. We would actually be losing money with 2 in daycare. Good thing on maternity leave I already was doing whatever I could to learn a more frugal lifestyle.

My miscarriage left me in a dark place and it wasn’t how I imagined being a stay at home mom.

Not to get all “listen to my sob story”. But this is a part of my story. It took moving out of our townhouse to a new home to really give a new and fresh perspective for our family, lifestyle and me being home.

Being a “Homemaker” isn’t all, home baking and made from scratch, all the time. You can give yourself some grace when something is store bought. Or if you need a day to just REST, it’s OK.

When I mentioned it’s a big lifestyle change. I truly meant it. A big reason you resort to learning how to make things on your own, well it’s a whole lot stinking cheaper. Learning how to make a lot of my own stuff, lead me to reading blogs and watching lots of YouTube videos. I’ve been reading blogs for so long, I feel more confident than ever to be able to share my tips and experiences on here.

I’ve never learned to be more frugal. I thought my childhood growing up was frugal living.

What does my typical day look like?

We now have 3 kids.  Thankfully our oldest son is mostly independent, I love watching him learn. Still teaching our second son to potty train (its rough) and our little girl, just loves to give lots of smiles and is super easy going.

Some days I can make the yummy drop cheese biscuits (pictured above) to go with Sunday soup. Other days I grab a bag of cheese buns when I go grocery shopping.

If there was one thing I recommend if you are home like I am.  Invest in a Kitchen Aid. I would NOT bake as much as I do if I didn’t have this on my counter. When I’m in a good mood, and want to bake, I run this thing a few times a week.

**Here’s my affiliate link for a Kitchen Aid.

Can I Bake, Cook, Clean, Sew, Mend Clothes, Cloth Diaper, Cut Hair and Have time for myself. Yes, but not all at the same time. I definitely do my best to do all those things but in the end give myself space to take some time “off”.

Being a mom there is no “Part Time or Full Time”, your a Mom “ALL the time”, in a good way.

Allow yourself a break. Even if that means when your husband walks in the door and you hand him the kid that’s been crying all day and walk out. You need to get away from the kids after a long day. I’ve done it, it happened one time that I had to GET AWAY. I’ve learned now how to decompress during the day. Remember when I said it being a big lifestyle change?

It does help that our oldest is starting to shift into helping more around the house. Yes, my husband is a HUGE help too.

Life is sure changing though since I first became a mom. Life with 2 boys is busy. Now there’s a lovely little girl in my life.

I’m not a perfect parent.  I have friends and family that are parents that I look up to, they think I’m crazy when I tell them that. I’m always learning how to do things to make home life easier or flow better.  There is lots of great advice and NOT great advice out there, be mindful of that. You just gotta figure out what works for you and your family as a mom.

What’s it been like for you?  I grew up with a stay at home mom and it’s such a different world we live in today compared to what my mom grew up with and what my parents had when they raised me. We can always learn something from sharing our stories.

Now I’m making the transition to being a “work at home mom”.

Let me know if there is a topic you want me to cover?

If you made it to the end, Thanks for reading!

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** I’ll be adding products to recommend from Amazon.  This helps with everyday living. What could you do with a little extra money?

I’ll also be adding pictures with Arbonne in use in my home.  Pictured above is the Shea Butter Duo by my Kitchen Aid.

I have a public Arbonne Facebook page that your welcome to join to find everyday living tips and product offers there, send me a message if your interested.

You can also find my direct website link here.