For the most part, I feel like I'm doing an okay job with the enrichment activity part. Being a full time stay-at-home mom, with no kids in preschool, and living in Los Angeles, has helped with that. We have the time and the access to go to the zoo on Monday, beach on Tuesday, Science Center on Wednesday, farm on Thursday, and botanical gardens on Friday. It's actually pretty great! We get out of the apartment, we have fun, and we learn something.
But something I have noticed recently, potentially failing as a mother, is my kids are now expecting we do an exceptional activity every week.
Lately, my four year old has been asking every day what the plan is, "What are we doing tomorrow? And the next day? And the day after that?". Even throughout the day she will ask, "What are we doing after breakfast? And what are we doing after nap? And what are we doing when daddy comes home?". At some point, I turned into a cruise director for my four year old! And I have no one to blame but myself. I DO have every day planned, sometimes to the hour. At the beginning of the week I write down all our big outings, and every evening I write down what the plan is for the next day. Ie: wake, blog, children's museum, naptime, craft, etc". I've been doing this since college.
Now don't get me wrong, I believe some structure is super important for kids. But it doesn't mean I need to have every day planned out. Or even that we have to go somewhere every day. Getting out of the apartment and getting some fresh air is important but can't our "outing" for the day be going down to the gazebo to blow some bubbles? We stay inside when it's raining (so 3 days out of the year in L.A.) or when we are sick, but why can't we just stay home when it's a nice day outside too? It's almost always gorgeous weather here so it's not like we are going to be missing out if we stay in and do a craft, build a lego princess castle, or even let them have some screen time while I get a few of my own things done.
I need to stop feeling guilty on the days I don't take my kids anywhere. And I hope you other moms do to. I can only speak from the stay-at-home mom point of view, but sometimes I feel guilty if I don't take my kids to do something. They aren't in school yet, we have the time, we need to take advantage of it and get out and do something.
But I'm done feeling guilty! It's okay to stay at home when you're a stay-at-home mom right? I mean, it's in our freaking job title. So tomorrow, we're staying home (actually maybe Wednesday, we have fairytale dance camp tomorrow). Maybe we'll bake, maybe we'll do a craft, or maybe we will just play Peppa Pig for hours and watch a movie.
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| On the day we stayed home and turned a box into a car and watched Barbie Rock N Royals |
