Happy Hobbit Happenings

Last week I was reminded not to be too hasty in patting myself on the back. This is a blog about being kind of a shit mum.

Grumpy and I were invited by the Whangarei District Council, and NorthPower to show the Tesla and talk to people about Electric Vehicle ownership.

My mom and dad got the kids for a couple of days.

This happens quite a lot.  Sometimes she takes one or two of them with her on a trip back to Canada for a few weeks as well.

I Love our family dynamic, and her involvement is in no small part the reason we’ve decided to have a large family.  Well, that, and the fact Grumpy is a bit of an egomaniac in some ways, and wanting to take over the world.  If I wasn’t rather firmly opposed to it, I am quite certain he would knock up every willing woman on the planet in his quest to secure immortality.  This is not an exaggeration.

We had a great time at the show, and I’ll blog about that later.

The day we arrived back I had a very important launch party for a sustainable initiative for the New Zealand Women’s Refuge who opened a designer second hand boutique called Yellow Belle on Hurstmere Road, on Auckland’s affluent North Shore.  The party was perfect and followed by a business dinner with my two amazing business partners at Wildfire in the city.

Life.  Pretty grand really.

I had been patting myself squarely on the back for being able to juggle all this career, charity, life, and family stuff.

Like. A. Boss.

Then, I walked into the house to receive beaming smiles and big hugs and belly rubs from my two eldest children who asked how it all went and told me about their adventures while we were away.

Another win.

Still walking on rays of sunshine and self-satisfaction, I called out to our three-year-old.

“Adam honey!  Mommy’s home!”

Tears, wailing, and sobbing ensued from our bedroom where he was snuggled in watching cartoons.

I rushed in to see what was the matter and he was hiding from me.  HIDING FROM ME

I peeled back the blankets and exposed my red-faced little noisemaker that had tears streaming down his chubby cheeks.

He flung his arms around me and squeezed so tight I could hardly breath.  Still sobbing and wailing (now directly into my ear) I kissed and cuddled him and told him I loved him.

“I *sniffle* Love *sob* you *blubber* TOOOOOO MOOOOOMMMMMMMYYYY!!!! And I missed you so much!”  said my little bundle of abundant words and deep emotions.

Once he’d calmed down, and we’d had some time to just hang out we had a chat about big feelings. Adam has very big feelings and seems to have a lot more trouble controlling them (particularly his anger) than the other children did.

“So are you feeling better?” I asked my now calm and angelic son.

“Yes.  I just missed you so much.” He said giving me a squeeze.

“And you felt happy, and sad, and angry and relieved ALL at the same time when I came home?”

“Yeah.” He said as if a light had come on in him.

“And that’s okay.  I get like that too.  So many BIG feelings all at once, and so mommy has freak outs sometimes too.” I said smiling knowingly down at my child.

“Yeah, you’re a bit crazy sometimes.” He nodded and laughed in a facetious and cheeky tone far beyond his years.

“Shut-up.  You’re three.”

Giggles.

Take from this little snippet what you will.

I am not an earth mother, I am not wonder woman, and I am not particularly good at any single thing I do in this life because my personality and attention span keeps me pursuing so many different things.

But I adore our children and our life.  And we are doing the best we can to set an example of social and environmental responsibility, and letting them know that they are very Loved and exceptionally special.

Our life frequently exposes them to the reality they are not the absolute centre of the universe.  Plenty of people disapprove (some loudly) of the way we do things; others commend the chaos that we juggle.   None of this really affects us for the most part.  We are not normal, and neither is any family I know.  MOST of the women I know are better mothers in their domestic abilities and involvement than I, and I will wear that.  I am lucky to have my mom picking up the considerable slack in my wake and helping out at school and keeping her finger on the pulse of after school activities.  These kids ended up with me as their mother.  For better or worse.  And for the most part, I think they’re coping.

Thank you so much for reading.