I’m one of those children of the 70s/80s who grew up thinking I should “bring home the bacon, fry it up in a pan,” and never let my man forget he’s a man. We were supposed to strive to be “Supermoms” who were able to do it all.

And, according to the recent Advertising Age white paper “The New Female Consumer: The Rise of the Real Mom,” most of us do “do it all.” Their research showed that “…women with children still handle the bulk of the household and child-care responsibilities, the so-called ’second shift’ — whether they are working full time, staying at home or something in between.”

This is in an age when the Bureau of Labor Statistics reports both parents were employed in 62 percent of the 24.6 million families made up of a married couple with children under 18. And, in the 2006-2007 academic year, the U.S. Department of Education noted women earned a majority of higher-education degrees.

The full report embedded here is filled with many more such statistics, including a 48-year comparison on education, purchasing power, and wages. But, the “real mom” to which its title makes reference is what they are really making a case for in the paper.

They posit that “the second half of this decade has brought a backlash against the mythical Supermom — that hyperactive type-A personality who whips up perfect cookies and perfect children — and an embrace of the likable, more relatable real mom, who doesn’t obsess over the little things.”

The case is made that millennial women (born between 1980 and 1995) are leading this change in attitude. They are apparently not as “conflicted” as my generation — Generation X. While I grew up being told I was equal to men, what I saw was my own mother doing an unequal amount of work to keep our family running - that “second shift” we women are apparently still working.

“[Millennials] grew up with seeing a lot of moms working, being outside the home a lot, and decided ‘Hey, this isn’t what I want,’” Aliza Freud, founder and CEO of SheSpeaks said in the AdAge report. “So they may be at peace more with their not working or working.”

Nearly have of the women surveyed for the report said finding balance between family and career is “a joke” for working women and I will certainly agree with that. The tagline for this blog used to say that it wasn’t about balance, but about juggling.

As one journalist put it: “While no longer striving to be supermoms doing everything for everyone, mothers are looking toward being pragmatic and good enough, and making a real impact in the areas that matter most for them and their children.”

This AdAge report implies that marketers should help empower women to delegate responsibilities to spouses, children and even brands so that they will have “more time to be who they want to be.”

As Carroll Trosclair on Suite101.com rightly points out, “marketers have been helping women delegate work to products, services and brands for decades. But delegating work to husbands and children may be a new and controversial challenge for advertisers.”

Interesting Side Note:
While researching for this post, I came across a blog that mentions one of the ways information was gathered for the whitepaper. Kitchen Table Conversations, “a new user-generated video research service revolutionizing how qualitative research is conducted” was used to gather information on grocery shopping habits. If you’re interested in qualitative research methods, check it out.

None of us do. I can’t think about it. Literally. This is going to be the world’s shortest post because I can’t stand the topic.

But, here we are literally pummeled with news of Michael Jackson’s death and the news that he left his kids to his mother, with Diana Ross as the backup. And I got reminded that we (not the world, but my wife and I) still haven’t dealt with this issue at all.

I don’t want to leave my kids ‘to’ anyone. They aren’t antique dishes. I can’t think of anyone that could do it right like we could. It kills me. Every time we try to talk about it, I end up in tears. And I’m not a crier.

Thinking about Madonna helps, and Rosie O’Donnell - because they’re okay (says someone who has NO earthly idea, but they seem to be doing well).

I always thought it would be my mom - and it still probably is, but she’s here with us for the summer and she’s 66 and she’s vocalized her overwhelment more than once. It’s their energy and the whining and the nakedness and the peeing outside (um, lady, you’re the one that bought them that cute little french book about a little boy that pees in the grass) and the food allergies and the laundry and the…

I can think of some friends who fit the bill - but they have busloads of their own kids. My brothers? Nah. My in-laws? No thanks.

I hate this. Just thought I’d say that out loud.

So? I just won’t die - until they’re old enough not to need their mother anymore - which is about 35 as far as I can tell. I’ll be 68. Seems reasonable. Okay universe???

If anyone wants to leaves me a comment saying that I have to just choose and be responsible, please don’t. I know. I really, really do. I just don’t wanna leave my kids, like I said before, period. They’re cute, they smell good and they say things like, “Please bring me a book and close the door, I need to poop in my own privacy.”

And I love them more than the world.

Update: The first friend that read this reamed me out so hard on Skype that I thought my computer would burst. We’re picking a guardian, the lawyer is drawing up the papers. As this ‘friend’ said - ‘just hold your nose and pick someone.’ Well, if you put it that way…

Greetings all staff and stakeholders of Coddled Teenage Boy Enterprises.

It has come to my attention that there is some confusion about your roles and responsibilities within the organization, which has led to infighting, yelling, and name-calling—this happened just yesterday, prior to 7 AM. Such behavior is both unprofessional and upsetting, and it is my job as the CEO and central “brand” of this enterprise to address this situation before it begins to negatively affect morale as well as my performance in the marketplace, also known as “high school and social life.”

First, a word about the incident that prompted this memo and took place at headquarters yesterday. Many of you, I know, heard it—or heard of it—and I need to clarify actual events to dispel any notion that the CEO of Coddled Teenage Boy Enterprises was at fault. Because, as you know, it’s never my fault.

The incident took place in the early morning. It concerned the puzzling logic that asserts two individuals traveling to the same school campus should to be liveried in the same vehicle, and therefore ought to be ready to depart at approximately the same time, even if one of us requires more careful and meticulous currying of my excellent hair and a careful consideration of which band T-shirt looks most awesome with my jeans. There was some crazy bellowing about did I know the price of a gallon of gas, and some asinine stuff about the driver’s own needs (don’t get what that means), and something—completely overwrought now—about how It’s all about you, isn’t it?

All of this made the second and final shuttling to school tense and unpleasant, and left me grounded this weekend, which is a wholly unacceptable result of what I see as a giant misunderstanding. The bottom line is that the sister involved in this situation is… well, clearly, a Sister Subsidiary. Known officially as The Easy Child Enterprise, the Sister Subsidiary should be staffed and run as a separate operation, independent of the needs of Coddled Teenage Boy LLC. Especially since a tenet of that aforementioned subsidiary enterprise is Hates to Be Late, whereas at Coddled we take a much more interpretive view of the clock.

Now that we have that out of the way, I’d like to get back to the business of this memo, which is to redefine and, in some cases, reassign the various roles each of you play in keeping this enterprise running. As you know, we have grown in leaps and bounds over the past decade, growing literally from a Mom-and-Pop entity to a conglomerate with endless, gaping needs and demands. While it once took only one or two people to feed, diaper and bathe me, it now requires an entire staff to manage the complex operation that is my life.

You might think that because I have learned to actually use my limbs purposefully and have mastered other basic life-skills (like the ability to read signs, or jot down a note, or climb bus stairs, or use the toilet) I might exploit those abilities to increase self-reliance. But, sadly, the answer is no. In ways that even I don’t really understand, it seems that the operation has grown more complicated than ever, and it requires additional resources and more staff than ever to maintain.

Last year in Math, we studied Inverse Functions, in which the sign f “acts on” a number and transforms it. Essentially, you can define the inverse of f as the function that “undoes” what f did. My understanding is some enterprises grow precisely like that: As new products are brought to market, or new services introduced, others are mysteriously negated. In other words, it’s not my fault that company operations have gotten multifarious and increasingly unwieldy. You can argue the application of this point to my situation—but not with me. Take it up with a mathematician.

So without further ado, herewith the new Job Titles as reflected in this most current Reorg of Coddled Teenage Boy Enterprises:

Manager of Livery Services—Dad (AM Manager), Mom (PM Manager)

Director of English Essays, Proofing and Editing Division—Mom

Laundry Services—Mom, Dad, Sister-When-I-Have-Something-to-Bribe-Her-With

Bag Lunch Boss—Mom, Dad

Homework Helpers—Mom, Dad, the Friends-Who-Actually-Take-Notes-in-Class Squad

Personal Belonging Tracker—Mom, Dad, various friends (Gordon, Zach, Janey, Chris, etc.) in various classes who run after me when I leave my various shit behind

Shower Timer—Mom, Dad, Sister-When-She-Needs-to-Use-the-Bathroom

Forms and Paperwork, Small Details Division—Mom

Dispenser of Petty Cash—Whichever parent drives us to the movies

Emotional Support Team—Pretty much everyone, all the time (note on-call hours)

The two remaining jobs still available at this time are:

Minister of Wiping My Ass

Director of I’d-Forget-My-Head-If-It-Wasn’t-Attached

Referrals welcome.

It is my dearest hope that this memo will help you to accept and relish the critical job you have as part of Coddled Teenage Boy Enterprises—and to see yourself for what you are: part of my team, because we are all in this together. As they say, there’s no “I” in “team.” And there’s no “Boy” in there, either… God knows I can’t do this on my own.

Regards,

Coddled Teenage Boy

P.S.: Has anyone seen my soccer shorts?

(From an original post at Annarchy.)

If your house is like mine, you walk in the door at the end of a hard day hoping to hear an excited “Mommy’s home” only to be greeted with “I’m starving!” and “What’s for dinner?” I’ve had many days when I’d walk in from the garage and never make it further into the house than the kitchen during the first hour I was home.

So, when I recently saw an offer for TwitterMoms to try out The Six O’Clock Scramble® free for one month, I decided to give it a whirl. It’s a program that bills itself as “a seasonal online weekly menu planner and cookbook.”

I don’t normally take on offers to do reviews of products, preferring to keep any endorsements you ever see from me free from any implications that they’ve been bought. But, the offer to send me weekly e-mails with meal plans and even ready-made grocery lists for them just sounded too good to pass up. In addition to e-mailing me recipes that claim to take 30 minutes or less to prepare, the web site has a searchable database of dinner plans and a blog with categories as varied as eating locally, breast cancer and snacks. Named cutely, Scramblog, it’s meant to be an exchange of healthy eating tips and experiences for busy families.

So, for the month of March I will be enjoying a free trial membership to The Six O’Clock Scramble and I’ll let you know here how it goes. The Scramble team has also created a promotion code — TwitterMoms – that you can use to get a special discount of $5 off the usual Scramble six-month subscription price of $29.50 ($10 off the annual subscription).

You can try along with me, or wait to see how it works out for my family!

Hi. My name is Laura and I’ve been twittering for two years. (this is where you say “Hi Laura!”) Don’t know what Twitter is? Here’s a great video explanation: Twitter in Plain English

While some might think it is an addiction, I view it as more of an ingrained communication channel much like the cell phone and e-mail have become. Lots of people are using it, including many celebrities as wide-ranging as Lance Armstrong and Brittney Spears. But, I don’t usually follow many of them. It seems they either update rarely (hello Luke Wilson) or don’t fully engage by following others or replying to tweets.

But, I’ve begun to watch something interesting develop with a celebrity family on the site: Ashton Kutcher (@aplusk), Demi Morre (@mrskutcher) and now her daughter Rumer (@therue)

I discovered them through a news article about Ashton’s comments regarding the recent brouhaha surrounding Michael Phelps and apparently his comments about neighbors had previously caused a stir. He is obviously updating often and appears to be engaging with those who talk to him through Twitter.

Some think that the couple’s tweets about upcoming projects are just for publicity, but that strikes me as a bit self-rightous. I mean, hey, aren’t about half of everyone’s tweets a bit of self publicity? I tend to think she means it when Demi replies that they just find Twitter fun!

And, now she’s encouraged her daughter Rumor to join that fun:

I’ve tried to interest my husband in Twitter several times, but with no success. Since my girl is only six, getting her on has not crossed my mind, but if she were Rumer’s age it might. It could give us both greater insight into each other’s day - that chance to look through each other’s eyes.

What do you think? Could this new means of connection be good for families?

[UPDATE: Looks like M.C. Hammer (yes, he of big pants fame) is getting in on the family twitter act, introducing his son to the world recently]

Screenshot of MCHammer twitter

Laura P. Thomas is the wife of a former rocker and mother of one 6-year-old girl that’s already waaay too interested in The Jonas Brothers (the apple didn’t fall far). She works in the Global Online team at Dell, evangelizes virtual worlds, and twitters too much as LPT.

I’ll spare you the excuses about why I haven’t posted in months. (Gulp.) There are plenty of you out there who work full time and parent full time, too — and still manage to commit regular blocks of time to blogging. I admire you, and I wish I had your dedication. Somehow, my dedication gets spread around too thinly to other things. Ah well.

For the past several months, I’ve been working on a project with my 15 year old son, Alex, who is a gifted pianist.

His newest CD, Christmas Keyz, is now available for purchase on Amazon.

As you can imagine, there is much to tell about this. I tend to get wrapped up in the details of how long he’s been playing (11 years), the contests he’s entered and won (another post someday), and the remarkable paths he has ventured down that have each contributed to his musicianship, performance abilities, and altruistic maturity.

But what really matters is that he’s accomplished something unique, something beautiful, and something that brings joy to other people.  He stands a little taller these days, and that’s a sight that makes any mother’s heart nearly brim over.

This holiday season, Alex will take his music to a number of community events, including the local library’s “Visit with Santa” and a local elementary school’s “Santa Shop.” But his favorite audiences are the ones he’s been playing for since last June — the residents of a few retirement centers. He most enjoys playing for “the regulars” who gather to hear him play, who grasp his hands and look him deep in the eye as they thank him for bringing his music again, who cajole and tease him and press candies into his palm with a sidelong glance at mom.

You can check out clips of his music on his website at The Music is Key. (His site, BTW, was designed by fellow TMG Blogger, Rachael Cahours Acklin. LOVE her work.) You can watch him play his original arrangement, “Noel the First” from that site or on YouTube and Facebook. His MySpace page has a complete MP3 file of another of his original arrangements, “Away in a Manger”.

Alex is currently in discussions with a number of charities. We hope to have a special promotion sealed in the first week of December. For now, he’s watching sales closely, hoping that they edge up to the point where he can recover production costs on the CDs, website design, and marketing. He hopes to make enough to be able to fund his next two projects, a CD of his original compositions and a CD of his favorite anime themes (hauntingly beautiful works from various scenes in lesser-known video games).

I couldn’t be more proud of him. I hope you’ll stop by his website and read a little more about him. I hope you’ll consider purchasing a CD or two — as a proponent of the arts, as a supporter of young enterpreneurship, and/or as a voice of approval to a teenage volunteer musician giving back to the greater community. Thanks — and Merry Christmas.

I’ve been away for too long, my friends.  My family and I have just had too much chaos in the past few months and I finally had to put the brakes on this out-of-control train, do a little audit of what was and wasn’t working in our little universe, and figure out what to do about it.  Of course, with all that’s gone on over the past few months, that’s taken a considerable amount of time!  In any event, my sincere apologies for staying away for so long.  It’s good to be back.  :)

So, about the title of this post:  An Extreme Life Makeover. Sounds sort of drastic and official, doesn’t it? Well, that’s how it feels, a little bit.

Many things have happened in the past few months that have prompted us to have to get a little drastic and official.  Thankfully the end result is that I - and we - feel like we’re finally finding our feet again, feeling more confident, happy, excited.  And it feels really, really good.

I’ll start off by getting you up to speed on what’s been going on lately…

As you might recall from my last few posts (from August and July, to my utter mortification), my wonderful husband was downsized out of his job back at the end of June.  I’m not going to lie: It was at times enormously stressful to have the primary bread winner NOT, well, “winning bread.” Nonetheless, I think he - and we - have handled it with as much calm and optimism as we possibly could in the circumstances with two children to support, a mortgage payment and all the other usual bills to pay.

There have been several things working in our favor, not the least of which is that my husband is a one-of-a-kind, wonderful, calm “glass is half-full” kind of guy. There’s also the fact that my husband has a fantastic network of personal and professional contacts.  We were stunned by how many people contacted Dan after his job loss, whether just to voice their support or to provide him with contacts or job leads.  If any of those people are reading what I’m writing here, please accept our heartfelt THANKS, because you kept us both hopeful and positive.

I think my husband’s strong work ethic and workhorse personality were also factors in our surviving the past few months.  The man refused to treat any of his time unemployed as “vacation” or “down time,” and he spent every day making phone calls, sending out resumes, finishing antiques “projects” he’d acquired over the years so he could sell them on Craiglist, helping friends complete home improvement projects that they lacked the ability or knowledge (or tools!) to do themselves.  He kept his mind and his body engaged the whole time, and I admire that about him.

So where am I going with this?  Well, let’s just say that Dan’s job search is over.  And we’re pleased as punch!

Don’t get me wrong: I loved having all of that one-on-one time with my husband and am grateful that fate threw us that curve ball when it did.  Dan had been stressed out and anxious leading up to the downsizing; once it was over and the dust had settled, he was back to being himself, the guy I know and love: calm, happy-go-lucky, driven, optimistic.  With his perspective back, it was nice having him around more, and the new routines we developed bouncing around the house together all day every day have been sorely missed now that he’s back to work again.  But Dan was ready and excited to begin his new professional journey, and so far, so good!

There are two other things that came up recently that have also forced us to examine our lives a bit more closely, especially when paired with Dan’s job situation.   Continue Reading »

Hi, friends.  It’s been awhile since I last posted; please accept my apologies.  As you might imagine, life’s been a little bit… strange around the G family household this summer!  

I say that because of this earlier post about my husband being unexpectedly downsized out of his job a month or so ago.  Remember now?  Okay, moving on…

It’s taken some time for all of it to really sink in for us, considering that I was already unemployed at the time (having chosen to leave my job early in ‘08 to stay at home with our son) and then there we were, both of us unemployed.  But while reality has sunk in, the panic really hasn’t.  Not yet, anyway.  

Financially, we figure we’re okay for several months if we’re careful, so that’s not so much a problem just yet.  And, really, there haven’t been ANY problems that have arisen out of the situation.  

Nope.  It’s all been pretty good, actually.     

Dan has been a million times less stressed out, which seems somehow wrong in the circumstances, but is actually really nice.  He had spent so many months being anxious and on edge in an environment that had become increasingly tense and unpleasant, so when the ever-looming question “will I be next?” was finally answered, it was almost a relief just to know so we could finally stop wondering and worrying.  

And not only has he been less stressed out, but he’s been surprisingly and gratefully optimistic and positive for the new opportunity that he’s been given by way of this unexpected career detour.  Our networks had rallied so quickly and effectively in the immediate aftermath of Dan’s downsizing that he had over half-a-dozen interviews lined up within the first two weeks, and he’s still in the running for several of those positions.  The tremendous support and encouragement our friends and business associates have shown is overwhelming and wonderful, and I know it has helped keep Dan’s outlook positive.  It’s good to feel wanted, to feel appreciated.  And that he is.  

It’s also been nice to have him around more.  Yeah, those first few weeks were a little rough with us bumping into each other every time we turned around, but once we acclimated to all of us being home together all the time, we realized that it didn’t have to be hell!  We’ve started taking picnic lunches together, down to the lakefront, to a park, to the zoo.  We’ve taken time to go for bike rides, kick a soccer ball around in the backyard, take our dog for a walk, play a game.  Even just running errands together has become a nice little treat that we can do together.  We’ve felt more like a family in the past month than we have in a long time, and I think it’s because Dan’s mind is no longer preoccupied with the stress of his old job but is open and clear and looking to a better future. 

Aside from all that, we’ve been spending a LOT less money, which has helped us realize that we CAN spend a lot less money than we were.  Of course, spending less is a natural byproduct of finding ourselves mutually unemployed, but it’s not like we became paupers the minute Dan was downsized, so it wasn’t absolutely essential that we suddenly pinch every single penny. I think we’ve both just started really weighing whether something is worth spending money on right now, and we’re both coming up with “no” as the answer far more often, even with something as simple as stopping by Starbucks while out running errands.  It feels good.  I think this is one thing that’s going to stick with us even when Dan finds his next opportunity.  

Which leads me to the next segment of today’s post… 

Interestingly enough, one of the opportunities that Dan has been pursuing is with a company based in Georgia.  

Because Alexis is here in Wisconsin, Dan and I have never in our 10 years together considered the possibility of moving elsewhere.  Until now.

And, I tell you, it’s like a whole new world has opened up before our eyes.  We’ve been going through the past 10 years with blinders on, never thinking about or imagining making a life for our family anywhere other than where we are right now, probably because we’ve never had to think about it.  Funny how a job search in a crummy job market can force you to think outside the box!

Sure, in my early twenties I dreamed (often) of moving out to California, getting my big break in Hollywood and living out my days along the Pacific coast.  But those dreams went up in a cloud of smoke when I met Dan and decided he was “The One,” because his then 2-year-old daughter was here, which meant he had to be here.  

Alexis is now 12.  And while it would be very hard for us to move farther away from her, and it’s not what we’d prefer to do, at least it’s not as hard as it would’ve been when she was so little, and we may have to move in order to keep the ship afloat.  She’s old enough to understand now that even if we aren’t here physically, she’d always be in our thoughts and our hearts and would be just a phone call or plane ride away. She’s also at an age where she’s developing more of a sense of adventure, so the prospect of being able to visit us someplace totally new and different is kind of intriguing to her.  

The toughest aspect of us potentially relocating now is that Alexis is still adjusting to life after her mom and stepdad’s divorce, which became official in March after nearly 10 years of marriage.  Her stepdad was her day-to-day dad for all intents and purposes, and they had a wonderful relationship, so it’s been a big period of adjustment for her.  Fortunately, her stepdad has remained a strong figure in her life in the months since, and he and her mom have remained friends in the aftermath of their divorce, so we feel confident that he will continue to play a positive role in Alexis’ life.   

All of that notwithstanding, the fact that Dan was willing to consider the possibility of relocation for the one opportunity has resulted in us realizing that the scope of his job search can be so much bigger than we’d previously thought.  And it’s actually fortunate in the circumstances that I’m also unemployed because I’m not tied here by a job either.  We’re at the perfect crossroads in our lives to look at making a major move, and I have to admit that it’s a little bit exciting, realizing that.  

There’s nothing to keep us from going to Georgia, or North Carolina, or New York, or California, Seattle, Portland, Denver…  The world (or at least the United States) is literally our oyster right now.  How cool is that?!? 

Now, if only our friends and families would stop sending us emails and leaving us messages saying that we’re not allowed to move…  Although I suppose it could be worse: They could be encouraging us to move away! 

Thanks to those of you who have followed our story and offered words of encouragement - we really appreciate them!

Amy Giampetroni is a happily married woman, a full-time stay-at-home mom to a preschool boy and a part-time stepmom to an adolescent girl, living in Wisconsin. You can read more about Amy here and at her blog, Average Everyday Super Woman. Click here to check out Amy’s other posts on This Mommy Gig.