SAHM You can be too!

When my hubby and I were dating three years ago, we would spend long hours in discussion regarding family and our life that we each wanted to have.

His life consisted of having a family, and nurturing it with a good job and lots of values and love.
My path consisted of me having a family alone and having an incredible lucrative career with lots of parties. That was when we were 22.

When we dated we decided to wait till marriage to be together. Also we decided together that we could stay home with our children and raise them. With that I had a lot of issues at first. I thought that wasn't possible. I really did think any marriage I entered wouldn't work. Rightly so b/c we tend to follow and believe we will repeat our parents statistically. I didn't even realize how silly that was at the time but I could live my own life. Change the course of the path I was going.

I just assumed since it happened to my mom and I looked up to her and she was soo smart and an amazing independent woman and she raised three kids by herself that I would do the same thing or at least I was prepared to.

Well my hubby convinced me after much frustration that I could stay at home and it wasn't a horrible thing. I was like well what will I do? It was scary to take that step and really when I agreed to it, I didn't think it would happen. For some reason I thought that we wouldn't have kids for a long time or not at all. So I wouldn't worry about it.

Well good thing we waited for marriage because 4months after getting married we were pregnant. When I was pregnant it was so much fun. I was really peaceful thru the entire thing.
I was working my "dream job" at the time and it turned out it wasn't so dreamy.
I guess thru my entire college and before that I pictured that my identity was inside of the job I held. In fact, it isn't. It's in your character and actions every day. You can do so much with what God gifts you. That doesn't necessarily mean you have to have a "career".

Believe me I heard everything from you're wasting your brain, your education is worthless. It was tough. Especially after I had my first, I would go places and even family gatherings and people would ask what are you doing now. I would say proudly staying home with my son. They would just move on to someone more interesting. I am interesting. I believe anyway. Haha.

I just wanted to explain that there is a way for everyone to stay at home if you want to. You have to redirect your wants and needs and prioritize your finances. We still go out from time to time and we pay bills.

You have to have a budget and plan.

It's a little sacrifice for a huge gain. My 2 year old can recognize all his letters, his numbers thru 20 and he is even starting to read. I am not wasting my intelligence by sitting with him.
It's not all sitting around watching elmo and listening to his toys either.

You can go to museums with other moms and while your kids play you can discuss things going on in the world or whatever.

Just think of waking up in the morning, going to workout, and having a clean house you have plenty of time to decorate it. Laughing and not missing out on any of your son's first moves.

I had a friend who worked in a daycare who let me know if a child did something for the first time, they wouldn't tell the family. I personally would want to know for sure.

Now that's just us. I'm not saying this is for everyone and everyone should do it and if you send your kids to daycare you are terrible. I personally understand that this is a option. And I want to establish the case that it is possible for everyone if you try it.

What got me on this today was my hubby got an email asking what are some good daycares b/c daycares these days cost just as much as a house payment. When he told the person that we stay at home they said they were jealous and wish they could because of all the benefits.

You can do it! That also reminded me that when we were deciding while we were dating way before we even had children, the work issue would give us 50 extra bucks a month. If I worked also and we had to put them in daycare, that is all that would be adding. So the weight of that doesn't balance out to warrant that. I can always go back to work in a couple years. I can research and figure out what I really want to do.

with love.