The Flying Homemaker

We've all filled out applications, surveys, and opinions polls where the question of occupation is asked. I hate it when there is no option for me to put as a stay-at-home-mom, and I must put "unemployed", "other", or "not specified". My preference, when offered, is to put "homemaker"

As a mother, isn't that what I do? I make a home for my husband, my children, my guests, and myself. And it is a 24/7 task. It entails many of the things typically associated with a housewife: cooking (though not well), cleaning (another area where my perfectionism has its limits), managing the household, being a taxi-mom to my 4 kids, etc.

But it really goes deeper than that. Being a homemaker means making my home a haven. There are aspects of it that are very job-like, but there need to be aspects that provide me and my family with spiritual nourishment, emotional safety, and loving stimulation.

These have been goals, but I have often been my worst enemy in achieving these goals. I am a certified discouraged perfectionist. If I can't get everything done and done perfectly, I don't do it at all. So my life was spent either slaving myself until a sterile house was the result, or doing nothing due to the depression that engulfed me when I felt overwhelmed.

I have subscribed to the Flylady rule of thought in being a homemaker. Her website, http://www.flylady.net/, has changed my attitude and perceptions about being a homemaker. Slowly, but surely, I am letting go of my habits of putting perfectionism before being available to my children. A system of routines and daily managment has taken over where a perfectionist goal of a perfect house used to be. I am no longer depressed at what I am not as a homemaker, but looking to find my niche in this vocation I have chosen.

I am not a crafty person, I don't have the visual skills to have a perfectly decorated house, I don't enjoy cooking, I don't know how to garden or do yardwork very well. However, I don't have to be those things. I need to embrace the blessings I can give my family, and let go of trying to attain the "perfect" homemaker qualities that are contrary to my personality.

I love to read and enjoy reading to my children. I like to be organized and I like to maintain a calendar. I love to cheer for my children at the sporting events and applaud them at their dance performances. I like to bake their cakes on their birthdays...using cake mix from a box, but still, filled with love. I love singing and dancing, and doing so with my kids makes for good exercise.

The great thing is that letting go of perfectionism has actually given me time be be the more perfect mom I am striving to be. I do my routines and cleaning "assignments" fo the day, and then I'm done. No more days where baths or prayertime gets skipped because of my overwhelming goals, or because I have konked out in exhaustion in front of the TV or computer and just don't feel like being a mom that evening.

And not only that, but the routines and cleaning zones actually WORK! My house is maintained well. No, not completly spotless 100% of the time, but clean, tidy, and organized. It makes for a more comfortable environment to truly BE in. And I'm not over-tired so that I can't even enjoy the home I've made. My children and husband aren't forced to temper their play or relaxation time out of fear of messing up the house I just obsessively cleaned.

I do fall off the system here and there. I am hoping that won't happen this holiday season as it did last. But, as Flylady says, "Baby steps...."

I am grateful to Flylady and her crew. If I were an employee in a homemaking factory, I would have been an ill-prepared, untrained worker. But now, I have been taught the tools I need to excel and to truly be called "homemaker."