There are a few things you have to let go of when you become a mum: your abs, a spontaneous social life and your desire for neatness.
That’s not to say I ever had a six-pack or an immaculate house, but now that I’m stretching my time between four people instead of one I’ve had to relax my standards a bit.
I now live with school bags in the kitchen, notices all over the fridge, footy boots at the back door and homework all over the kitchen table. We’ve built extra cupboards, hung notice boards and encouraged the kids to work in their rooms, but it seems our kitchen is the natural hub of all activity and clutter. So I live with it.
School holidays, particularly wet ones, are the most challenging. I would come home from work midmorning to find two kids still in their PJ’s and a variety of projects on the go.
For Talia this usually involves scissors, textas, sticky tape and mountains of paper. The table becomes art central as she makes pictures, letters and cards for everyone.
Nick assembles his regular holiday tent. He strings sheets across his room and drags his mattress onto the floor. He has a sleeping bag, water bottles, a torch and a wonderful time. So what if I have to tiptoe around the chaos for a fortnight?
As long as the place remains hygienic I figure we are doing ok. I won’t let salmonella kill us but I don’t want to let stress get to me either.
We do lots of baking and I take a deep breath as flour covers the floor and the occasional egg is dropped. Floorboards are easy to clean.
That’s not to say I don’t have moments that really stretch my patience. I remember the very day we moved into our house. We found a corner for the kids and set them up with a few toys to keep them busy as we went about unpacking. Talia was a toddler and I put her in front of her easel. What I didn’t bank on was her sweet little eye seeing a blank canvas that was exactly the same colour as our lovely clean walls. Her artwork covered the paper then continued onto the wall beside her. Luckily it washed off.
I have a friend whose toddler decided to paint her fingernails, and the bathroom tiles. That was a little more permanent.
As my husband taught me to say, ‘Control the controllable.’ If it’s an accident and I can fix it, then I can deal with it. There is no point in going off my head over the small things.
One day the kids will leave home, the place will stay tidy and I probably won’t know what to do with myself. I also know my social life will return.
But I think my abs have gone for good.