To be, or not to be...

So my intention with this blog is to pull together my experiences raising my kids with information relating to my struggles. I am hoping that it will help me to be a better mother and maybe someone reading it may find useful information, too. Who knows if it will turn out the way I want it to, but I do intend on using it for journaling purposes, too, so I should write here often.

So a little more about me. My name is Melissa. In May of 2002 I was married to my husband and within a few months found out were were expecting a child. Halfway through the pregnancy we found out that we were having two. In April of 2003, Gabriella Elizabeth and Isabella May were born. Then, in November 2003, we conceived another child (thankfully ony one!). Deborah Margaret was born in August of 2004. We have a Pembroke Welsh Corgi and two domestic cats. We live in Minneapolis in a small rambler... too small for all of us, really, but it works, I guess. We tried to sell our place to move into a larger home, but it didn't sell-- the feedback that we heard was that it was too small. Yeah, exactly why we were trying to egt out of there. And now that the baby was born, we don't really ahve the money any more to move. Oh well.

I am an executive assistant for a large financial firm, working in the investment banking area. My husband is a case assistant with a large local law firm, though he will be staying home with the girls beginning in a few weeks. That is scary for me. To know that I will soon be the sole provider for a family of 5. I tried staying home with the girls for a while once and couldn't hack it. But that is a whole other story. And since I make more than R, it doesn't make sense for me to stay home anymore. That, alone, actually makes me breathe a huge sign of relief. I don't want to be a stay at home mom. I used to want to, and then I tried it. R really is getting excited, but I wonder how long it will satisfy him.

R. has been having a mid-life crisis of sorts. You can't really call it a mid-life crisis since he is only 28, but that's as close as I can get to describing it. He hates his career. He has all of these ideas of what he wants to do, but none of them are rational ideas at the moment. They all require a whole lot of time or start up capital, and won't pay anything out for quite a while if at all. We can't afford for him to be out not making money and to have the kids in a daycare. Hell, we can't even afford to have him at home! Life is going to have to chage, soon. In addition to all of that, R wants to run for State Senate in our district. It will take time and a whole lot of donated money to lose. There is no chance for a Republican win in our area... the numbers from the past prove that fully. But he wants to do it anyway. I will never understand why...

Anyway, more about me. I love photography. My dream is to one day have a art/protraiture business all of my own. It will never happen, but a girl has to dream. I am completely addicted to an internet parenting community called Pregnancy.org. The support and information I have gotten from members and friends on those boards is amazing and was probably the only thing that kept me form going completely bonkers to this point. I love to read, but have no time to do it. I love to write, but find that I have no creative energies... so I waste my writing urges on PO and here. I am addicted to reality TV, but have no time to watch TV. I want my kids to have everything that I never had in life. I want to be the perfect parent and raise my kids by the book, yet I am always thankful when I can get them plop down in front of a TV for 30 minutes so I can have a second to go to the bathroom, and they have been eating peanut butter since they were 9 months old. As I get more experienced at this parenting thing, I realize that my real goals are to survive the next 18 years and to raise my children in a house filled with love.

I want that most of all-- for my kids to know that I love them more than anything on this earth and that family is the most important thing there is.