The grass is always greener ...

The grass is always greener at my parents' house. Actually, it is. My dad has a beautiful lawn. Us, on the other hand, have a pothole for a yard. A pothole with a couple dandelions and a few tufts of crab grass here and there. I kid you not. This extreme summer was hard on our landscaping. Well that and an adamant refusal to water our grass to keep it verdant looking. Lance is going to scold me for calling our yard a pothole.

But I digress.

The grass is always greener on the other side of the fence. When I worked full-time, I envied my friends that got to be a stay-at-home mom. When I went to part-time all I wanted was my full-time salary back or to just be at home all the time. And now that I'm a pretend stay-at-home mom, I miss working. Well, maybe not exactly the act of working, but the ability to have time where I'm not "mommy." So either the grass is always greener or I'm the most flippant person ever. It could be a little of both :)

Both statuses are tough, but in entirely different ways. When I was full-time, I spent a fair amount of my day wondering what Lucan was up to and whether or not he was being good. I worried about all the other stuff I had to get done when I got off of work. I tried not to focus on all the germs Lu's immune system was being exposed to. Now that I'm at home with Lucan, I worry about his social development and if he's tired of hanging out with me or misses playing with lots of other kids. I suddenly have all that time I thought that I would have being a stay-at-home mom, but yet, none of the time to get anything done. I feel like I spend most of my time in the kitchen either making food, feeding Lu food, cleaning food off the floor that Lu thought would be fun to watch splat or cleaning up the mess I made preparing food for Lu to eat. Hit the repeat button in two hours and it's lunchtime! I find that at lunch Lu would prefer whatever food I've made for myself than eat what I've made for him. (Do you ever feel like God created the same behaviors in your child that you yourself exhibited as a wee one? Um, YES. I distinctly remember always thinking that my mom's food always tasted better than whatever was on my own plate. And then stealing her food. Lance asked my mom the other day what my favorite food was and she sort of hemmed and hawed and didn't have an answer. Because I was a HORRIBLE eater as a kid. So when Lu throws his peeled apple slice on the floor and pulls the kind of stuff I pulled as a child, I smile and sigh because God knew EXACTLY what He was doing when He made my child.)

Oh. I digress. Again.

But I miss adults and being able to logically reason with someone (besides myself). I miss not living in fear of waking Lucan up from his nap if I'm not quiet enough. I miss my grown-up clothes (on the flip side, I DO NOT miss all the ironing that comes from having to wear grown-up clothes). Getting out of the house is important. It allows me to turn a blind eye to the bathroom that could really use a going-over. I love watching Lucan do his little happy dances and being able to tickle and make him giggle madly. I love being there to see the progress he makes every day in walking just a bit further. I love my little conversations that I have with Lu after his naps like how his pillow ended up on the floor or why there are extra stuffed animals in his crib. He just looks wide-eyed and innocent as if he had nothing to do with any of it.

Everyone loves a naked baby. Especially a baby who is undressing his favorite MLB mascot.

Not working has granted me the opportunity to see if the grass is really greener on the other side of the fence. From where I'm standing presently, both sides look a little dry and crusty and in need of a good watering.