Why My New Job is Insanely Great (with pictures)

I've come to know that I'm good at a few things.

Well, more than a few things. Let's be honest here, The Maven is a domestic goddess of epic proportions - I mean, unless we're talking about cleaning, budgeting, organizing or parenting. Otherwise, I'm pretty much great at everything home-related.

What I wasn't sure I'd be so good at after all these years? Office work. And then, suddenly, I was doing it twice a week: dressing up, commuting, carrying around a fancy organizer, and using my brain for things other than grocery lists and new discipline strategies. I'd like to smugly admit how wrong I was and say that I totally rock the job world, but I'm not exactly sure just yet. Right now I'm happy with at least being mediocre at it. What I do know is that my boss rocks at being a boss and my job is spiffy cool. This has made the transition far less painful than I had anticipated, and, dare I say, rather fun at times. Even the filing.

Don't believe me? Allow me to demonstrate:

First of all, this is the area I work in. It's a hip and happening part of Ottawa called Westboro. This particular shot isn't so great, but it was taken in a hurry a few days ago as I was on my way into Bridgehead to get a coffee. The neighbourhood is actually way nicer than this, but this will have to do until I have time to take more pictures. Coffee first, artsy pictures second. The Maven has priorities.

I always wanted to live in Westboro, but I would have had to pawn my arms and legs to buy even the smallest house there. It's a trendy little urban hot spot of a place. I live across the river with the less trendy folk, but I get to be uncool in my four-bedroom house on a half-acre property that we can afford, so I think I'll get over it. Now I do the next best thing and work in lovely Westboro - and it's a great place to work, indeed. For, not only do I get to walk around and look at all the adorable little shops and drink fabulous fairly-traded coffee, but I get paid to be there. That's right, folks: I get paid to be there. Sure, I'm going to end up spending all my paycheques on all the pretty shiny things I see during lunchtime, but this is okay as long as nobody tells my husband (I can easily disguise that type of spending as "groceries" - domestic superpowers, remember? Shhh.)

Pretty shiny things that I want to own. (Just have to sell the children first.)

So maybe I can't afford a $700 bicycle just yet (the green one with the peacock designs on it just about made me cry tears of joy and run into the store with my credit card - resistance was nearly futile), but I have been enjoying spending a bit of money on yours truly. It's become apparent that I'm totally worth it - how did I not see this blatant fact before?

Look what I bought when I took the kids clothes shopping this weekend at a secondhand store? (I tell the kids we're "recycling" by hitting the consignment stores before looking at new clothes. Cheap ass budgeting carefully disguised as environmentalism - another one of my superpowers)

"A" is for "Amanda" and for "awesome." And also for "asshole," but we'll overlook that little coincidence.

Best part? I bought the darn thing for $3.99. And sure, monogrammed purses went out of style, like, two years ago, but now I can just say I'm retro and not just a broke mom who had to wait until she found a used one. Saving the earth, one outdated style at a time.

A bit of preface before the next couple of pictures: Boss Lady has an incredible sense of humour and keen observation skills. I'm quite sure she noticed my rapid breathing when we were making a list of stationary supplies. This tech gal loves stationary, and I especially love post-it notes. They almost turn me on. I love them in all colours, all shapes and sizes, all-- there I go, getting aroused again. Post-its are a thing of beauty. You can use them for anything. They have helped tremendously with my filing, note-taking, and with little reminders like "don't forget to turn off the heat before you lock up - and fix your hair, too. This humidity probably makes you look like a harlot."

Anyway, I walked in this morning to find my desk in a state of post-it orgy. They were everywhere, showing themselves to me with - gasp! - to-do lists on them. It doesn't get better than that.

Serious hotness.

I should point out that each and every one of those lovely little things had something important written on it. No trees were unnecessarily slaughtered for my amusement. But I do appreciate that Boss Lady used a medium that would grab my attention. Emails are great, but this got my pulse racing. And wouldn't you know it? I finished every single task listed upon them.

The way to The Maven's productivity is through sticky pieces of paper. Go figure.

But the very best - the absolute best, best, best surprise in the month I've worked in my new job, was what I found on my desk last week.

I'm going to admit something here; In support of my two youngest gremlins who have become obsessed with a certain teen pop sensation as of late, I decided to bite the bullet and give Justin Bieber's music a try.

And, uh, I kind of like it. Quite a lot, actually. He's a talented kid. One could say I adore him - minus any creepy physical attraction to a boy young enough to be my son, of course. I'll leave the dreams of being serenaded and kissed to girls (and a certain percentage of boys) half my age. But I will never say never to his music again. Them's some catchy beats, yo.

Boss Lady loves poking fun at my Bieber Fever. She has absolutely no interest in my oddly preteen musical preferences, but she reminds me of them at every opportunity. This came to light when a much-promised "Bieberizing" of my workspace recently took place. I unlocked the office and walked over to my desk to find a new garbage can filled with stationary (including the highly-coveted post-it notes). If that wasn't enough awesomness for one day, Boss Lady decided to customize my trashcan:

There are no words to express how great this is.

She drew the hearts in herself, and added "Amanda" underneath "Justin Bieber - Favorite Girl." This incredible garbage pail now sits proudly next to my desk.

She is madly in lust with Eddie Vedder of Pearl Jam. There will be calculated retaliation in this war of idols she started. I will Vedderize her but good. I can't say how just yet, but I will come up with something amazing, being The Maven and all. Stay tuned.

PS: Have I mentioned I love my job?

What Love Looks Like

I didn't realize how antsy I was feeling as of late until I started heading into the office part-time. Now that I have something else to focus on for a few hours each week, the desire to perform a self-lobotomy while at home has lessened quite a bit.

I think I was feeling burned out. Days at home with a four-year-old were looking mundane rather than relaxed, and our activities were simply time-fillers rather than the exciting adventures they used to be. With a couple of days of work to shake things up a little, I'm jumping into my Tuesdays, Thursdays and Fridays with a lot more gusto.

Or, it could just be the new espresso machine. Either way, something's working.

As we were sitting in the living room this afternoon - Spawnling with a drinkable yogurt and me with my period-week chocolate-covered almonds, I realized just how much fun I was having hanging out with my littlest gremlin. We had just gone to pick up a movie and some snacks at his request, had no particular schedule, and were just enjoying each others' company. It felt good, happy, perfect. So, I snapped this picture:

After fourteen years, this part of my life will soon be over. This beautiful, frustrating, wonderful, exhausting, magical, runny-nose-filled part of my life. I'm slowly phasing it out and heading into something new. In September, Spawnling will be going to junior kindergarten four days a week. I'll be using that time to grow my business. Just like that, my stay-at-home-mom days will be finished - with the exception of Friday. I will have hatched and raised three gremlins full-time, at home, until they went to school. That's one heck of an accomplishment. But it's especially special with Spawnling.

Try saying that three times fast. I dare you.

If you've been reading long enough, you know that Spawnling was not exactly a planned pregnancy. We had "not been careful" for a couple of years after Gutsy's birth, knowing full well that my body was more infertile than fertile and thus would not produce a third offspring easily - especially since I nursed the middle gremlin until the age of three. 

Once we found out that Gutsy also had hearing loss at two-and-a-half, we made a firm and final decision not to have more children. We were at peace with that choice. I started looking forward to doing something else: going back to work, watching my two boys grow up, being able to stay in our smaller home and drive smaller vehicles. I thought of the money we'd save, the trips we could go on, and how life is designed for a family of four. Planning is so fun, isn't it?

And two weeks later, the pregnancy test had two lines. The world shifted. I wasn't sure whether I should laugh or cry. Geekster and I walked around the house for several days feeling stunned. It took a little while to get happy and even longer to get excited. I put my dreams of a career on the back burner, and focused on being a new mom again.

Then, suddenly, he was here, and he looked at me with his big, beautiful eyes. And I knew he was meant to be here, that our lives were about to get even better because of him.

What love looks like

He grew some more, became even more beautiful, and I started to wonder if he was just trying to show off.

What love looks like a few months later

And now he's four. Four! Where did the time go? How did we go from a shocked moment staring at a pregnancy test to having long conversations about how the solar system works while simultaneously building lego rocket ships? 

Today, Spawnling told me "Mom, I love you more than pizza. So that's, like, a lot."

I love you more than pizza too, little buddy. Even the pepperoni variety. I win.

12 Reasons to go Back to Work after 12 Years

1. You get offered a near-perfect job. The hours fit, the work suits you, the commute is short, and you still get to sit around in your jammies for three weekdays and a weekend if you so choose (and you so choose). You've been working from home doing contracts for a couple of years, but this will get your foot in the office door once again.

2. The heating company is sending you polite reminders to pay your exorbitant oil bill, and any offers made by you to "work it out in trade" have resulted in the threat of sexual harrassment lawsuits.  Prudes.

3. Going somewhere where the furniture isn't covered in peanut butter stains* is a nice change of pace.

4. Being able to think clearly - and not just in between bouts of intense fighting/screaming/threatening/toy-launching - is a really neat trick that you look forward to.

5. Getting organized down to the minutest detail the night before you drive everyone to school and yourself to work brings out your inner OCD Virgo, and she tingles with glee at the thought. Lunches made, clothes laid out, house clean, bags packed-- oh, there we go, getting all excited again...

6. You just happen to work for the coolest boss lady on the planet, and you're not even exaggerating all that much, even though she reads your blog. (Reading your blog, incidentally, just ups her coolness level, anyway). You've known her for awhile, share a mutual love of caffeine and Doctor Who, and she gets what it's like to be a mom who's trying to balance a job, too. I have struck managerial gold, people. May this mine be bountiful.

7. The Boss Lady says you can use the space during off hours to practice with your Justin Bieber interpretive dance troop. (You did say that was okay, right, Nat? I'm pretty sure you also said you wanted to join)

8. After your first day of work, there's a knock on the door, and a flower shop delivery person hands you a big bouquet of these:

Thank you for being my cheerleader, Lil. It means a lot! xo

9. After over a decade, you get a little giddy saying "I have to go to the office this morning." In fact, any excuse to say it is welcome, and your Facebook statuses are filled with those words to a sickening degree. Thankfully, everyone must sense your excitement, because they're being uber supportive. Thus, when you're CEO of Awesomecorp (I'm a working mom now, folks. It's all about ambition! AMBITION!!) you shall reward them all for their allegiance to your corporate ladder climbing campaign.

10. As a writer, you're going to enjoy coming up with interesting ways to present your administrative assistant tasks during Career Day at your child's school. It takes an enormous amount of talent to make "filing" and "proofreading" sound like "surgical rotation" and "space exploration," but I think I can do it. I look forward to exercising my imagination muscles like most other parents on the planet.

11. Because you finally had an excuse (like you needed an excuse) to buy one of these beautiful things to put in place of worship upon your kitchen counter:

My life is now complete.

12. Your husband hugs you this morning, hands you a coffee, and says "I just want to thank you for everything you do to keep this family running smoothly. You're amazing and beautiful.**" And that small little thing blossoms into a really big thing and makes you get all teary. Dammit. And you realize that all the work you do - both inside and outside the home - is incredibly important to the your little family. That feels so. very. good.

*The jury's still out on whether or not those stains are peanut butter or another brown, organic substance, but I will deny, deny, deny until it can be proven otherwise.

**Okay, maybe he didn't say the "beautiful" part, but that was assumed, even in my nasty pyjama pant getup. It's not a workday, okay? Cut me some slacks.

Buffet (of life)

MmmmMmmMmMmm. I miss you, buffet.

BUFFET noun

A meal at which guests serve themselves from various dishes displayed on a table or sideboard.

The Maven wishes there was a local gluten-free buffet, because she misses them. 

There is so much going on right now that I don't even know how I'm finding the time to blog. I must adore you all immensely to whore out what little energy I have left unto you and your reading pleasure. You're welcome. You can pay me back in coffee.

There are big things afoot for The Maven. Monetary things. Job-like things. I have a fairly large contract I'm working on right now, plus another one looming (and not official until I sign on the dotted line in virgin blood, of course). And I use "looming" in the most positive way possible, because I'm actually quite excited about the whole thing. I like the idea of working part-time because it keeps my mind busy. 

The Maven's mind is a very scary place, indeed.

I also like the money. I like being able to pay bills without feeling sick to my stomach. I like not always having to say "no" to my kids when they ask for something. Turning my children into spoiled brats who get everything they want is an important part of being a Generation Now parent.  I especially like not having to tell myself "no" all the time. I want to say "Yes, Maven, you may have that beautiful pair of boots," and "Yes, Maven, you can buy a latte at Fourbucks today and not shed a single tear of guilt as you enjoy it." I'm a simple woman, but even simple women have needs, yo. 

What I'm not ready for, I've realized, is full-time work. I think that would be a huge shock to my system and to my family after being home for so long. I want to ease back in slowly, and wait until all three gremlins are in school full-time before I explore that option. The contracts that found me are perfect; And they have found me, which is the really cool thing. 

I'm not a God person (no offence, God people), but I do believe that when I put energy into the universe, it often listens. Between the moment I had the realization that I was ready to move from casual work into something more regular and the time when I was about to start telling people I was looking for just that, these contracts found me. Both were from amazing people who I admire and respect. Both are very suited to yours truly. Both are exactly what I was looking for right now, and what I need to get my professional groove back. I've been out of the game a long time, folks. This is some scary stuff.

I have worries about being able to balance it all. Can I really add more stuff on to my already full buffet plate? Can I still maintain my mothering mediocrity and pay some bills at the same time? Having worked out logistics with my husband and talked it over with the Gremlins Three, I've come to the conclusion that I can. I'm The freaking Maven, Mr. Bigglesworth. I can juggle a machete and a couple of vials of tiger's blood, no problem. I can figure this out.  I'll still see my kids off to school, I'll see them after school, I'll spend time with Spawnling on days when he's home. But I'll also be making room for something I want to personally, professionally, and financially. 

So what if my plate is already full? Life is a buffet: a delicious, Chinese buffet. And my plate is full of yummy, MSG-filled food, but it's missing something: chicken balls. 

You can't go to a Chinese buffet and not eat chicken balls, because that's like reading Playboy for the articles. Nobody does that, even if they say they do. 

I've realized through a lot of soul-searching that, my serving of chicken balls is important to me. It's the missing side dish on my plate of life. It's not that I don't enjoy my family beef and broccoli, or friends shanghai noodles, it's just that I didn't have work chicken balls on my last four plates of food and I need to have some before I leave. So I'm going to cram them onto this plate. Eventually, the rest of the food will settle around the chicken balls, and everything will be as it should. And I will be happy, because I will have a decent work-life balance balls in my mouth.

Life analogies are awesome, aren't they?

So give me some love and support while I make this terrifying/awesome/overwhelming/exciting trip to the Chinese buffet, ok? I promise to save you some balls.

Raise Your Glass

Some days, I dream about having a job-- nay, a career. (Sounds fancier, doesn't it? And if I stick "path" at the end of it, it raises its trendiness level significantly.)

Some days, I dream about coworker lunches, pats on the back, raises and accolades. I want to hear "Nice job, Maven!" or "You're a real asset to the team, Maven!" And I might even like to see people make "TEAM MAVEN" shirts or sparkly handbags. Frankly, I don't know why this hasn't been done already.

Some days, I want to be able to shop for me without guilt. I wish I had a reason to buy nice clothes or shoes or put highlights in my hair. I dig the red and a I totally rock the locks, but a secondary hair colour and a straightener might be nice things to have if I had a good reason (and the means) to get them.

Some days, I would love to be able to leave the house and all responsibilities therein in the capable hands of another while I drive off to work for eight hours. Or, better yet, I dream of dropping off my little mess-makers at somebody else's house while my home spends eight hours not getting messed up. Coming home to a clean house: that's the equivalent of a domestic orgasm.

Some days, I don't want to say "I'm sorry, but we can't afford that right now" to my kids. I would love to be able to surprise the gremlins with a vacation that involves hats with ears, ridiculously long lines, stupidly expensive food, and-- actually, screw that. I'd take us on a really big boat. The idea of little umbrellas in my virgin drinks on a floating resort definitely beats fighting our way through a sea of tiny tots just to get a picture with a giant mouse.

Some days, I tell you.

There are some days - like last Friday - when I look at my life and feel, well, a little dissatisfied. I feel like I'm spinning my wheels. I feel like I do the same thing day in and day out: Wake up, breakfast, get kids to school, clean, cook, lunch, clean, play, snack, clean, homework, dinner, clean, bedtime, clean, rinse and repeat. Fight to get them to school, fight to get them to bed, fight to get them to do their chores. Break up arguments, solve problems, find missing mittens. And for what? So that I can get yelled at, talked back to, told that my meals look gross with a push of the plate? It's not exactly motivating.

Sometimes, like on a frigid Tuesday night when I have a bit of money in my pocket and I'm off to get groceries for my family -- only to discover the heat in my van isn't working - I panic because I don't know how we're going to afford to fix it and buy food. I think about getting a job to make our money situation easier, only to realize that I've been out of the workforce for years, and jumping into a career at 34 isn't exactly simple. I feel frustrated and want to kick things. Instead, I drink tea and eat chocolate and hope to the Powers that Be that it was a glitch brought on by the extremely cold weather (It was, and it worked on Tuesday morning. Phew.)

Some days, I wonder if I made the wrong choice to dedicate nearly a decade-and-a-half to raising my kids. I worry that I may have given up the opportunity to do something greater, something bigger than my domestic life. Maybe I could have been a great novelist, a doctor, a teacher, a politician. All except that last one are very meaningful careers.

The last few days have been a time of reflection brought on by doing way too much on far too little sleep. I looked at what I've given up: formal education, bigger retirement savings, better financial security, a feeling of personal accomplishment, a life of my own outside my family - and I wondered if I made the right choice.  On days like that, it feels like I've spent 14 years helping other people achieve their goals at the expense of my own. Mothering is pretty much all I've ever done in my adult life.

And that's the dark side of being a stay-at-home-mom in the 21st century. Because there are choices available to women these days other than slapping on an apron and procreating (not necessarily at the same time, but whatever floats your boat); because the norm is to live on two incomes, not one; because the question of "what's best for our children?" is a blurry, hot topic in our generation; because it's considered an outdated practice, circa 1952.

Being an at-home parent flies in the face of today's societal norm. There aren't a lot of us around these days. When you think about it, it's kind of badass. Rebelliousness of the stick-it-to-the-man variety.

I'm feeling a little bit rock n' roll right now. Maybe Pink made this song for me.



(I have a bit of a crush on Pink. It's hard not to.)

Yesterday, I kept a coughing Spawnling home from school. We made hot chocolate, sat by a warm fire in the living room and watched Sponge-Bob together. We cuddled under a blanket in our pyjamas, cozy and warm. It occurred to me that I didn't have to worry about missing work, because this is my work. I don't have to worry about using up sick days, or about sending the gremlins to school or daycare hoping that that they're not as sick as they seemed in the morning. We may be stressed about money sometimes, but I'm not stressed out spending time with our little demons. I consciously savoured the moment.

Later, I received a phone call from one of the support professionals we deal with for Gutsy's and Intrepid's hearing loss. I gave her a rundown of everything going on and the list of all the things we're doing to try and improve the situation. She complimented me on my efforts. I realized then that I could only do everything I'm doing because I have the time to do it. They are my full-time responsibility, and I can do a bang-up job because of it (which is an expression and should not be confused with violent acts toward my children. I don't beat them; I only think about it - sometimes in a great amount of detail.)

Later still, I experimented with some gluten-free baking. I whipped up a pan of peanut butter chocolate blondies that probably cost a whole $2 to make. I would have easily spent $8 or so at the store for a specialty baked item like that. So I may make less, but I also save us a lot of money, too (minus the coffee habit that I can quit any time so why don't you step off about it and back away from my grill?!)

My life isn't perfect, nor are my choices. But the epiphany I had is that there are no perfect choices, and that's okay. There are pros and cons to absolutely everything. I've spent 14 years witnessing first steps and first words, but as a result the gremlins three have witnessed their dad and I stress over paying the bills more than if I were working full-time. I can spend all day cooking, cleaning and eating bon-bons playing with Spawnling, but that stuff doesn't show well on a resume. I can be there when they come home from school, but we often have to say no to after-school activities. I can feel accomplished when I've reorganized the pantry, but no one is going to present me with an achievement award.

Choices, balance, acceptance. This is the path I chose for me, for my family, for us. It means a lot of things both good and bad. It means that I will probably never have a great career unless I forge one for myself as a writer. That's okay, I'm an excellent writer and destined for greatness - or at least some Maven-infused mediocrity. In the meantime, I'm going to stop being so hard on myself, quit questioning my every move, and fully throw myself back into the fray pure joy of full-time parenting without guilt.

And hope beyond hope that one of these contracts I'm bidding on comes my way very soon so I can keep the caffeine mainline going. Just sayin'.

I am the stay-at-home-Maven, after all. Raise your glass.

Penis Envy. It's a woman issue.

I sometimes struggle with inadequacy as a stay-at-home-mom, as if I'm somehow not doing enough. Never enough.

I watch my working mom friends cook, clean, do homework and all the other things I do in a day, all while balancing a career precariously on a gorgeous pair of stilettos. On top of that, they often have the financial means to do things we only dream of, like take vacations, save a reasonable amount for retirement, and not want to puke from the stress of Christmas shopping on a tight budget. I don't know how you do it, ladies, but hats off to you. You could see how, if we were comparing penises, I might feel a wee bit embarrassed by mine. From here, it looks like yours is bigger and can do more things.

But this morning, as I read a brand new blog a friend of mine started called Sprung Onto the Spectrum, I was taken back to a time when what I do today sounded not only overwhelming, but next to impossible. Her most recent post talks about how she felt when her son was diagnosed with PDD-NOS a few months ago, and how far she's come since that initial feeling of complete devastation. Reading that post gave me a quick kick in the ass. It's exactly what I needed to get out of Eeyore mode.

(You know, Eeyore mode? Where a little back raincloud follows you around as you eat thistles and talk in an emo voice about how bad things are? If you need a demonstration, come by right after one of the vehicles breaks down and we need to figure out how to pay for it. I put on a good show.)

The truth is, I'm my biggest enemy. I undervalue myself far more than I should by insisting I could always be doing more: more one-on-one parenting, more educating, more housework, more baking and cooking, more family outings, more budgeting, more writing contracts, and more coffee drinking so I can maybe jump high enough to reach the impossibly high bar I've set for myself. Then, hopefully, I'll hit my head on said bar and pass out so I can stop acting like such a douche.

The Maven can act surprisingly douchey. I suppose it helps balance out my awesome.

I have two kids with hearing loss. That involves a heck of a lot more than just slapping some hearing aids on and sending them off to school. Over the years, we've had a team of support that involves the likes of teachers, in-class aides, ENTs, audiologists, audioprostheticists (try saying that three times fast), psychologists, speech therapists and integration specialists. I end up running around the national capital region more than a call girl on government pay day.

I have one child who not only has hearing loss, but anxiety. He has massive panic attacks that manifest as meltdowns. He has additional appointments to learn the skills to deal with it, and we spend a lot of time calming him down and reassuring him that he's safe. Then, we spend more time helping the other kids understand and deal with his outbursts. It's a jolly good time.

Sometimes, I forget that we have all these extra appointments and situations and that so much of the time I think I'm supposed to have is eaten up by them. I blame human adaptability. Life since these diagnoses has become our new normal; so much so that I forget how much I do in a day to keep this family going. Like my friend, I morphed from the devastated, heartbroken, sick with worry parent into a mom who accepts and loves her kids for who they are (most of the time).

Unfortunately, I seem to have gone the extra mile and am now beating myself up for not doing more with my life. See? I'm so douchey that if they named a Disney Princess after me, they would call her Doucherella.

And I'm not the only one with this self-destructive problem. This seems to be pervasive in the mothering community as a whole. It's a rare woman who is completely confident that what she does is more than enough. The rest of us seem to wade through this mess of inadequacy and self-doubt.  Then we wonder why we eat our feelings.

Oh, wait. That's just me.

I think taking personal inventory of our lives every so often can be healthy. When we take the time to look at where we are, how far we've come, and all we've done to accomplish these things, it's rejuvenating. This morning, I was reminded that I do my fair share in this society of ours. I don't need to do more, and in fact I probably could stand to do a little less. This is true of a lot of women I know, whether they work at home or in an office, whether they have one child or five, special needs kids or not. Single, married, broke or comfortable. We all need to give ourselves a pat on the back.

In short, I think we should all pull the balled up socks out of our crotches and stop comparing.

Today, just repeat this motto: My proverbial penis is bountiful, my proverbial penis is bountiful, my proverbial penis is bountiful.

You're welcome.

Seasonal Sanity-Saving Survival Strategies (SSSSS)

I woke up this morning in a panic. It dawned on me that school is almost over and the summer mayhem will soon commence.

Including today, there are only five - 5, cinq, cinco, - days of school left for Gutsy. Intrepid finished last Friday and has been home playing video games skulking around the house eating everything in sight enjoying his summer ever since. Today, he gets interviewed for a seven week training and work placement. If he gets in, that means he and Gutsy won't have as much time to try and kill each other.

I'm positively buzzing with excitement at the prospect.

... Or maybe that's just the extra large coffee.

Trying to prep a thirteen-year-old boy for an interview is harder than you might think. For one, there's the grooming thing. Because girls are only a passing curiosity and not a full blown obsession just yet, the boy is not really into his appearance. I've effectively had to pick out his clothes for him. He probably would have shown up in his favourite fashion statement: a black patterned t-shirt and navy blue basketball shorts with a stripe down the side. I keep wondering what Stacey and Clinton would say about that. The possibilities are endless.

Then, there are the interview questions. I have no clue what they're going to be asking him, so I don't know what direction to guide him in. Because this is a community program, the questions could go from the very professional to the extremely personal. Rumour has it they tend to favour at-risk kids for this program, so I've given Intrepid full permission to use whatever would make him sound at greater risk for running his life into the ground at a moment's notice. Things like: "My mommy used to drink too much," "My little brother is seeing a social worker for his anger issues," and "My dad's work cut his hours back and now my parents argue over the bills" are all excellent choices.

Look, you have to use what you have. None of those are lies or even exaggerations, right? Do they mean Intrepid is destined for a life of crime and meth? Probably not, but we can let the program director be the judge. Heck, I fully plan to go in shortly after my grueling morning workout - the one that leaves me looking like complete ass. Nothing says "Mom is jonesing for her prescription pills again" like a little sweating and shaking. Throw in a faint "I need to get to the pharmacy soon" smile and he's as good as in!

All our dysfunction has to pay off somehow, right?

Anyway, back to summer. There are some good things and not so good things on the horizon, coupled with a whole lot of unpredictability. As a stay-at-home-mom, I don't have my kids signed up for camps and daycare and all that other stuff, which means I need to come up with a list of seasonal sanity-saving survival strategies. Intrepid possibly getting that job is one of them, but there are other very important items. For example:

- We have Gutsy's therapy sessions in place. Once per week through the summer. Thank goodness for that. If anything, it'll give me an hour to sit in a waiting room and read a book. I'll make sure to bring a coffee, too.

- I cleaned the master bedroom. If you're like us, your matrimonial bed is lost in a sea of toys, a mix of dirty and clean laundry and anything that needs some place quick to go before company arrives. This may not seem important in the grand scheme of things, but trust me: it's essential. With a clean bedroom, I can give myself a mommy timeout without worrying about tripping over last year's Christmas boxes. And heck, if the rest of the house is in summer disarray, I can just serve tea on my bed when people stop by.

- Great, fantastic, fabulous news: After over 18 months, they're restoring Geekster's full pay. We'll get half of what was lost this summer and it will be fully restored, in steps, by the new year. What does that mean? We might be able to go see The Karate Kid and Toy Story 3 instead of having to pick one and wincing through the cost of it, thus battling the 'We never do anythiiiiiiiiiiiing!' whining -- well, until mid-July, anyway.

- Park dates, park dates, park dates. If you're my friend and you're local, you're going to get a phone call to head to a park at least once or twice over the summer. There, you will be greated by a somewhat unkept and twitchy me with a trio of rambunctious kids. And if you avoid me, I'll find you. I'm a proficient stalker and I'm not afraid to coerce you into spending time with me and the Gremlins Three. You may now make preparations to leave the country if you wish. Don't say I didn't warn you.

Alright, must run. The skulky teen has an interview soon and I need to get my stoner game face on.

Conversations with Spawnling, May Edition

Forgive me for not blogging much over the last couple of weeks, but I've been playing with this new concept of - get this - writing for money. Did you know you can actually get paid to write blog posts and articles? I also learned you can put other people's numbers into a spreadsheet, and that action gets translated into currency in your pocket. Seriously. I'm not even making this stuff up. All it takes is working full-time as a mom while simultaneously working part-time as a writer, trying to write sensible sentences while being screamed at for more apple juice, and subsisting on lots of coffee and an average of five hours of sleep every night.

You, too, can have this dream life!

Making a living with my mad skillages is nice and all, but there's nothing like a good freebie of a blog post to really let loose. This is why I don't have advertisers, giveaways, or anything else on here. I get to be me, without interruption, and without being owned by The Man, whoever he is. This is freedom money can't buy, baby.

For example, advertisers may not want to show off their parenting wares on a site where the mom parents poorly half the time, and Spawn-isms are commonly displayed for all to gasp at and chuckle about.

You know what Spawn-isms are, right? All good Stay-at-Home-Maven readers know that Spawnling comes up with the most inappropriate hilarities. Offensive to some, knee-slappingly funny to others, this is a three-year-old I'm simultaneously proud and mortified to call my son.

Today was no exception. We went out for lunch with Jobthingy, who had a day off from that work stuff she usually neglects me for. (Why we're still friends after what she puts me through , I'm not quite sure. ) We ordered our food and sat a perfectly acceptable length of time waiting for it, while we drank our drinks and chitchatted and did our best to keep a three-year-old entertained. Meanwhile, Spawnling would let out a whiny "I'm hungryyyyyyyyy!" or an "I'm staaaaaaaarving!" or a "When is my food going to be heeeeeeeeere?" every so often.

Spawn's food arrived not 15 minutes after ordering. The waiter put the plate down and started to walk away. He wasn't halfway through the restaurant when my dear child let out a loud sigh and followed it up with an even louder "FINALLY." The waiter turned around, wide-eyed, looked at me turning beat red, and started to laugh.

He returned to the table a couple of minutes later to bring the grownup food and said "It's a good thing I brought his food out early, eh?"

Say it with me now: MOR-TI-FIED. That is my child, who came from my womb, who has this sense of entitlement built right into him. I don't know who, exactly, decided he was King of the Universe, but we'll be hard pressed to ever take that crown away now.

*~*~*~*

We get back home. Spawn is happily playing on my bed. I lie down beside him for a minute (see above mention of lack of sleep) and he comes in for a snuggle. I get sentimental for a moment - always a fatal mistake - and say to him "Please don't ever grow up, ok? I like three-year-old you."

"Even when I'm four, I'll still love you, Mommy" says he, and smiles.

If there was a sound for my heart melting, I would put it in here.

"When I'm four," continues Spawn, "Will I be bigger?"

"Yes, you will be," I answer.

"Will I have this?" he whacks my stomach and makes it jiggle.

"No, I don't think so."

"Will I have boobies?" he asks as he smacks my breast.

"Um, nope. That's a girl thing." I reply, warily. I can see where this is going.

He looks at me with that rotten little twinkle in his eye. "Will I have one of... Uh... what's that called again? That thing you got? Oh, yeah: a buhgina?" He giggles. "Will I have a BUH-GIIIIIIIINA?"

"No, honey. You'll still be a boy."

"So I'll have a PENIS! And you'll keep your BUUUUUHGINA! BUHGINA! BUHGINA! BUHGINA!"

"I'm going to go get you a snack now and sit you in front of a movie now, ok? Mommy needs to get work done."

"Okay, Mommy. Mommy's buhgina. Heehee!"

Welcome to my life.

How to sully your reputation, by The Maven

It's been a very good week, despite the puke.

Intrepid may have barfed down the side of the playroom couch and been home for the last two days, but the rest of mid-to-late-February has been pretty awesome.

Let's start with the reason I haven't blogged in a week: I was applying for writing contracts, and then I got one.

I got one!

Just like that, someone decided to hire me - and this was after I directed them to my blog. I'm not too sure what that means, and sadly I forgot to ask. Either they liked my writing style or they thought that any woman crazy energetic enough to raise three boys full-time can pull off pretty much anything.

It was like a dream job in so many ways. It looked like something I could easily do, be creative with, and actually learn something new in the process.

However, the odds were clearly against me: I applied for it on a site where I had yet to be hired by anyone, had no feedback scores from previous clients (that would require having previous clients on said site), and had a big fat $0 in my 'total earnings' box. Basically, I looked like a complete newbie in Bigwig Freelancer Land, and it was a long shot.

But I won it, likely because my awesomeness transcended even my newbieness, and it became clear to the clients that hiring me was the only logical choice.

...Or maybe it was the blog.

Nah, it was totally my awesomeness.

Anyway, I had a phone call with the project manager on Monday to discuss the work. Right before it ended, he asked me how I got into this freelance writing thing.

Wouldn't you know it? Normally witty Maven went off on a business tangent about how I've been writing for a while, and I have a background in IT but this suits my lifestyle better, and I've done a fair bit of local work, etc. I was trying to act all professional-like, and tripping all over myself in the process.

Lame, and oh-so-boring.

Hindsight is, of course, always 20/20. The minute the call ended I came up with many other, far better answers to the question, like:

"The orthodontist made me do it."

"It was either this or I go back to the meth lab, you know?"

"I used to sell black market babies, but with the economy the way it is people are skipping the middleman these days..."

"I used to be a rodeo clown, but PETA's been looking for me."

"Actually, I just find the contracts- I make my kids do the writing. You don't mind a few typos, do you?"

"Well, it sure beats hooking!"

It's probably best I didn't use any of those...

In the end, I did a good job, was finished early, and the customer was happy. I got paid, and the now Intrepid's undoubtedly starving orthodontist can buy some groceries for his family. I'm feeling all professional and full of myself.

And if anyone said "When do you not feel full of yourself?" I'm going to lock you up in the meth lab. Don't think I won't do it.

Tomorrow -- if I'm not puking (so far so good) -- I'll write about an amazing seminar I went to on Monday night that dealt with tantrums, which was the other highlight this week. I'm pleased to say that since then, when Gutsy or Spawnling start throwing a fit, I have far less desire to repeatedly run myself into the patio doors until I black out. This is a good thing.