I’m going to stay home!

52ish weeks of putting family first. I’m so excited!

The summer continues, and several weeks ago while cradling my littlest triplet R, I got a craving to hang up the high heels and just *be* with my boys for this last year before they start K-3 in the fall of 2011. Yes, we will continue to be broke longer this way, but as the years pass, it’s amazing to me how little money matters in the face of everything else.

That conviction was tested over the past several days when we went through one of our lean times. When a client is late on paying my husband, or two or three are late, and I’m not working but we’re still paying our nanny (for now, at least), it can get ugly, quickly. Dinners strung together with the strangest leftover things in our pantry. Milk for the little boys paid for by hitting up Coinstar. It’s never pretty, but we’ve gotten really good at it. We get by, and importantly, I don’t freak out about it anymore. It’s the life of a small business owner and honestly, it reminds me just how fortunate we are the other 85% of the time.

If indeed I stay home, which I need to decide in the next week or so, I hopefully will get even better at blogging. I probably should get back in the Twitter habit, because I’ve been profiling the adventures of my alter-ego, the frugal supervillain, regularly on FB. Last week on one day alone, I used a pile of coffee punch cards I had collected to keep myself in caffeine, scored a free pair of pants at the Gap, and then used an old Groupon for a facial. Not bad for someone with $7.52 in the bank.

As my husband likes to remind me, we are either the brokest rich people or the richest broke people out there. We have a good income, but it’s unsteady and our expenses as a large family are staggering at times. Staying at home is a big leap, not unlike the one he’s taking by starting law school part time right now, but I think we’re standing at the plane door together, parachutes in hand. Can you imagine that something like this is healthy for our marriage? That’s how much we both like taking risks.

We are so lucky that in the long run, we’ll be able to pay our mortgage, keep buying healthy food, stay insured, etc., no matter what I decide to do. And I’m luckier still that the internet keeps me in coupons and specials and free magazine subscriptions and in contact with friends that makes the insecure times still feel like a safe place.

From simple homeschool, the pearls of wisdom are just endless. Make plans, don’t let them make you. Declutter…

Similarly, at the start of the last year I felt so pressured to stay on track and finish our curriculum in 32 weeks because, well, that was the PLAN. It took me three weeks to realize that it was more important to actually absorb, learn and be inspired by the material than it was to stay on schedule.

That sounds like me, but more in regards to my hiatus this summer which hasn’t even led to me completing home school plans!

Even with my rummage sale behind me and the fact that we’re 7 enormous plastic bins lighter on kids clothes and stuff, I still think about the 100 item challenge every day. Happiness research aside, we need a lot of stuff for four growing boys, we get nearly all of it second hand, but the clutter makes me feel stressed and takes away from my peace, even though at the moment I am getting something we really need for pennies on the dollar, I know it’s the right thing to do.

I thought this time could help me find balance, but in many ways it’s put my lack of balance into hard focus.

Things I’d like to make sure I do:

• Get a freecycle or thrifted waffle maker and test out some gluten free recipes for my picky crew
• Get a head start on (eesh!) the holiday season
• Find recipes my husband will really like and try them out
• Start riding my bike
• Complete the purge of 0-24m baby clothes and stuff (I’m about 80% of the way there)
• Fall roster of activities for the little boys and their nanny
• Sell more books to used book store and good kids stuff to consignment store
• Join our local time bank and babysitting co-op

I know I’ve mentioned some of these things before, and some I’ve done already (rummage sale was a huge success - about $400 in the door and countless clutter out!, basement is organized and all upcoming clothes organized by size/season/type so I know what we’re still missing, and what we have plenty of — I’m looking at you, 3T pajamas…). I figure, my time with time on my hands will end soon enough if I am lucky, so I need to focus on what really matters until then.

I crave a simple home life. Not so much a personal life or a marriage, I like those to stay fun and complicated, unpredictable. But our house and our parenting, our food and our family priorities, clearly veer towards the frugal, the kind-to-the-earth, the thoughtful. Last week, we found out the little boys, my two year old triplets, are allergic to wheat. And a lot of my to-dos went out the window to try instead to figure out how to help them eat this way, which has already seen a noticeable improvement in their pesky eczema.

But.

And there is always a ‘but,’ isn’t there? It is very expensive. Especially trying to get gluten-free *and* organic food. And a lot of it doesn’t taste especially good to the toddler palate, which means it’s been an expensive and a wasteful time for us. Both things that make me a little crazy.

My grandmother suffers from Celiac Disease, so I’ve been around the block on label reading. We’re ahead of the game in that regard. But having $6 boxes of crackers being turned down by my small crew? It’s hard on my heart and my pocketbook. And again, I’m glad I’m still at home, with the time to research and try out new things. I’ve been to Costco, Trader Joes, and our local GF store, but I also have one boy who hasn’t eaten anything except applesauce in the last three days because he doesn’t like the new food.

There are lots of great blogs for grown up food. Now I just need to find (or make) things that my kids will eat!

One characteristic of the past few weeks is how much time I’ve spent reading. Books from the library, magazines I never got around to finishing, new blogs… I’ve gone through a large number of books I’ve really, really enjoyed, and my internet reading has introduced me to one new (to me) concept Radical Homemaking, which I don’t think I’m exactly doing, but I’ve always been the kind of person to be nearly radical, taking what I can and being pragmatic where I need to be, too.

Then there is the “slow” movement. I read about slow foods years and years ago, but it seems to be gaining acceptance in family and parenting circles as well. Slow summers, slow day camps… it all sounds a lot like our life, though I didn’t necessarily know it had a name. We are definitely slowing down, my husband and I narrowing in on our the careers we at least want to have for iteration #2 of our grown up lives, ones that fulfill us more and, definitely in my case, will hopefully allow for the balance I seek. As our boys all speed up, it seems more and more important that our home be the calm guiding hand for their days, the place where they can create and be inspired and follow their whims.

I think for the longest time I’ve sought this at home, but also wanted the go-go-go career that made it impossible. Time to find slow for my professional life, too.

I’m starting to get used to the reverse order of my days, where I accomplish things all week and then have to throw household responsibilities out the window for the weekend to focus on the kids. As such, I find myself doing a million odds and ends today to prepare for another semi-hectic weekend.

There are so many things that are rewarding about my hiatus — watching my body unbuckle from the stress, finally figuring out the best way to make t-shirt yarn, grabbing the raspberries and blackberries before the chipmunks get them all, getting rid of clutter and finding needed treasures in our basement, and living out of our pantry now that it is again organized. And of course, so much extra time with my boys and having a peaceful evening with my husband here and there.

I can’t even describe how much of my life was slipping through the cracks, or how good it feels to have it back.

If only I could do this for a living…

On my many happily-bubbling-but-none-boiling-over burners, I’ve got:

• Job hunting, basically sending out resumes and checking in with colleagues.
• Goal setting, since part of the problem is my lack of overall direction.
• Listening to a lot of music (you can watch my playlist grow, right now it’s just the two songs in my head these days).
• Garage sale planning (3 weeks to go) and garage sale shopping (I picked up a backless booster for P for $3, a Melissa & Doug Alphabet puzzle for $2, a pile of Mrs Grossmans stickers for $0.10/each, new sandals for P who blasted thru his early summer pair as usual for $2 NWT, and an awesome pair of perfect condition flats for me for $0.25. Oh, and a little tabletop Christmas tree for $0.25. Yes, I know we’re Jewish, but much of our family and all of our city is not, and P always asks for somewhere to put the ornaments and decorations that get sent to us. It’s really cute and has pine cones on it.)
• Preschool planning for the little ones. Full post with links coming soon.
• Clearing up back log. Full post on birthday parts with pics coming soon.
• Volunteering, as I mentioned yesterday.
• Cooking. Lots and lots of cooking.
• Discovering piles of things in the basement that I forgot about. I love the bag of girls’ clothes I’ve gotten at swaps for my friend who has GGG triplets, and the fact that I will clear that clutter when we see them on Monday.
• Took three bags of really nice clothes to the resale store in our neighborhood.
• Reading a lot, too. Books from the library as well as the piles of free magazines I get. Next week I’ll organize the magazine pile in the basement and take 90% of them to Half Price Books for a few bucks.
• Not working too hard so that I have the mental space for my husband and my boys that I haven’t had in oh-so-long.
• Blogging! I’m so glad to be back in the habit. Even if it’s totally self indulgent. But it’s good to have somewhere I can keep track of my progress and feel accountable for doing something every day, without boring DH with the details.

Back to work!

Part of the balance I’ve been seeking is (1) more time with my kids and (2) more time to do extracurricular activities, which often for me means helping to run high profile political events. It’s something I used to do for work, but now I just get to drop in a day or two ahead of time and help out. And I get to grab a ticket or two for my family, which yesterday ended up with this:

That’s my 5 year old, P. And you know who the other guy is. I feel fulfilled, as a mom and as an individual. Now I just need to find a job that lets me keep as much of this feeling as possible.

We’re still using tons of this stuff for the little ones’ eczema, so I was thrilled to see a steep discount at Amazon.

I got this email today:

For a limited time, we are offering an additional 15% off Subscribe & Save diapers and wipes in addition to the standard 15% discount you receive as a Subscribe & Save customer.

Since you have an active subscription for diapers and/or wipes on Subscribe & Save, you will automatically receive a total of 30% off all eligible orders shipped during this limited-time promotional offer. This includes the standard 15% Subscribe & Save discount plus a limited-time offer of an additional 15% discount.  No action is required to receive this additional discount.

And unrelated, was looking for more Aquaphor and sunscreen to order tonight. Why Aquaphor is included with this deal is beyond me, but I will take it, especially at $9/tub!