I am a well-intentioned, though occasionally haphazard mum. I am a working mom, and when I get home from work, I typically don’t even get to change out of my work clothes before I am on the floor playing with the minions. Dinner is frequently random bits of things I know they will eat, shoved into the little time I have with them. I have no shame and will sing to my child in public and make funny faces if it will keep them amused and/or keep them from screaming. I am not above bribery. My kids will follow the 5-10 second rule, and yes, I admit, I did not hand-wash bottles once I found out the dishwasher did a mostly good job of sanitizing. I lose track of baby bottles all the time, only to find my son walking through a room with one he found under a sofa, trying to suck down curdled milk. My house is inadequately child-proofed by most standards (including my own) and childcare and parenting on the whole in my house is a bit of an adventure.
I admit all of that. I love my children to death, and they are my world, but June Cleaver I am not.
Basically, I am TOTALLY imperfect pretty much all the time. I do most things wrong so on the whole, I try not to judge. But there are a few things that drive me NUTS:
- Mothers who have 20 bottles of sanitizer on them at all times but don’t put a hat on a baby in the sun when the poor things are squinting like moles and frying like eggs;
- Mothers who won’t look up from their iPhones, Smartphones, etc. to respond to their children every now and then;
- Moms that complain about how ill-behaved other children are but are too busy socializing to even keep an eye on their own;
- Children that are beautifully wrapped in complex ribbons and bows instead of comfy play clothes at the playground;
- Mothers that sit there and do nothing when their older children are running over the smaller ones on slides and ignore your meaningful glares entirely;
- Mothers that manage to look like a million bucks at all times and somehow magically avoid all the kiddie goo I seem to be forever covered in (I admit this is really complete jealousy);
- Moms that give ME superior looks because I DO have baby goo spread all over my shoulder and they are somehow pristine;
- Mom’s that go a little overboard with the Baby Einstein thing;
- Moms that won’t give their kids 20 feet of distance and allow them to run around and explore a bit in a safe place, knowing that yes, the world is full of danger but part of being a child is running and being crazy and learning about their environment.
There are probably more that I could include, but they are probably so horribly stupid and immature that I would not admit them publicly, and will keep them to myself out of fear of a good lynching or at least, boisterous objection.
What Most Bothers You???