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Articles on Family + Moms. |
content by tammy human
published: July 8, 2010
I guess the title of this week’s article could pertain to two things:
(1) My new ‘job’ as content writer for femail.ca (and yes, the
euphoria I felt during last week’s article has tapered off - but only
because of )...
(2) The fact that my family and I have just moved from northern Manitoba to
southern Manitoba.
It just dawned on me, while writing those two points down, how they tie into
one another. The first point is a relatively new experience. The second point
has been in the works for a little over a year and is the third move to
different communities my husband and I have done together. However, it is
because of the move that I am now a stay-at-home mom who is able to gain
article writing experience with femail.ca.
How many of you are members of the "sandwich generation"? Looking
after your own children and your parents? Back in May 2009, I thought I was on
my way to becoming a full-time member of that organization. I suppose I could
be considered a part-time member - at least in the mental sense.
Medical issues pertaining to both of my parents last year spurred our decision
to move back closer to both of our families. When the medical issues with my
parents first began, we weren’t even sure that my mom was going to
pull-through and if she did - how much care she would require. My husband and I
toyed with the idea of having one (or both) of my parents live with us once we
were moved. This, in turn, sparked a whole new set of questions and what seemed
to be a new level of stress. I’m sure many of you can relate. Long story
short - a year after we first listed our house for sale - we have moved, are
closer to our families but do not have my parents (thankfully, my mom did
pull-through and is semi-independant) living with us.
But I’m getting off topic. As I’m writing this article, we’ve
been in our new home for a total of seven days. We are still surrounded by a
multitude of boxes waiting to be unpacked. Our garage is even too full of
unpacked boxes to consider being able to park either of our two vehicles in it;
nevermind that it is a three car garage. I’m just thankful that this home
is more like a mansion to us in terms of size in comparison to the other homes
we have lived in. Our goal is to live in this house for more than five years
AND get all of the boxes unpacked. I (who I’ll admit is somewhat of a
packrat) have even resigned myself to finding "a place for
everything" and having "everything in its’ place" or else
it doesn’t belong with us anymore!
Our three kids have seemed to settle in nicely, too. I think our phone bill
will even get back down to half-decent long distance charges within a month.
For the first two days after we moved, all of them were constantly requesting
to phone their friends ‘back home’. I’m just glad that I had the
foresight to limit their calls to five minutes each! And now that they are
becoming more familiar with the neighborhood, the requests have dwindled to a
more-manageable level.
Of course, I am dealing with my middle-child having, well, middle-child
syndrome. Although she loves our nice, newer and much larger new home - she is
hesitant to try to make new friends. Because she had a very close group of six
friends in the community we had moved from, her theory is that if she
doesn’t make any new friends in her new community - she won’t have to
go through the heartache of having to leave them in the future. Thankfully, one
of her friends (in one of those long-distance phonecalls my daughter had made)
told her not to be so silly. Her friend told her that it would be crazy for my
daughter not to make new friends as long as she didn’t forget those she
had left behind. Such wisdom for a nine year old!
Our 11 year old son had been a little miffed that ‘the middle child’
got a bigger room than he did. However, just before we moved - we were able to
get a fantastic deal on a queen-sized bed for our son. (It’s nicer than
the one my husband and I share.) That has really helped out that situation.
Even our youngest, who no longer has to share a room with ‘the middle
child’ has, in her words, "learned to adjust" to sleeping in a
room by herself! That is great news for me because I was totally expecting her
to try to sneak into bed with me when her dad works the night shift!
I suppose I should go and try to get at least one more box unpacked and put
away before the day is done. |
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