The World According to Mommy

This is something I've thought about off and on since I started my blog, but recently I've been giving it more thought. I originally started this blog to document, and share with family and friends, my pregnancy and then all of Nate's pictures and the details about his growing up. However, I have really enjoyed blogging, and I would like to explore other topics of interest besides how fabulous my son is.

I am concerned that I may, possibly, be putting my family at risk my sharing so many pictures and so much personal, identifying information about us. I would definitely like this blog to continue, and hopefully one day grow into something great, but I think until I can figure out the best way to proceed there will be a moratorium on all Nate pics.

I'm not really sure how I'm going to change the blog. Maybe I will create another blog that is password protected (sorry, I know what a pain those are!) where I will share all the pictures of Nate. I want to be as authentic as possible, so not talking about my family would be impossible, but maybe I can find a way to do it without revealing as much as I have been.

I have the same struggles as a lot of women: how to be a good wife, a good mother, a good stay-at-home mother, how to live well but responsibly, etc. Hopefully I can figure out a way to continue to discuss these things while also recognizing the need to protect my family. And I hope you all hang in there with me while I do it.

Yesterday I went to Target to get Nate some formula and baby food. My total before coupons was $67.84, my couon savings were $8.00, so I saved just under 12%. This brings my total coupon savings to $23.72.

Two notes: 1. Even 8 months later I'm still sad that I wasn't able to breastfeed longer. I feel we've both missed out on something really important, not to mention the crazy cost of formula. 2. I believe this is the first time in the history of the world somebody has gone to Target and only purchased what was on their shopping list.

On Saturday I went to the grocery store and saved $10.32 in coupons. My total before the coupons was $97.50, so I saved just under 11%. Not great, but hopefully I can increase that percentage and not leave quite so much money at the grocery store.

So that brings my total saved in coupons to $15.72. And the way things are looking with the economy, I may no longer be saving for a new dining room table, but instead I may just be saving to buy more groceries!

I just wanted to let everyone know that Kelly at Almost Frugal is having a giveaway for free cloth diapers! These fit babies roughly newborn to 20 pounds, and they are used, but cloth diapers are not cheap, so this really is a great giveaway. Please head over to her site for details on how to enter.

Last Monday Oprah did a show which I have been avoiding all week. I recorded it on my DVR, and every time I went to play something else and I saw this one particular episode I had saved, I felt a sense of dread. I knew what it was about, and had heard a few people mention it, but I just kept putting off watching it. But I finally watched it yesterday, not because I wanted to, but because I knew, as a parent, this was not something I could keep ignoring.

Her show was about the sexual abuse of children. Children, including babies, some babies only days and weeks old, are being raped and molested all over this country. She talked about how these pedophiles take pictures and video of their victims and their evils acts and then trade these images with other pedophiles over the Internet.

This show was incredibly difficult for me to watch. It was brutal and horrifying. She showed images and discussed things that I never in my worst nightmares would have thought possible. After watching her show I had so many emotions, but one of the strongest was helplessness. I cannot go into all those homes and scoop up all the babies and children and rescue them. I cannot take care of business when it comes to those rapists and molesters. All I can do is contact my Senators, like Oprah suggested, and urge them to pass a bill which would provide more funding to catch these guys, as well as support the organizations which work to protect children. But that is not enough, and it breaks my heart.

Last night, before I went to bed, I went in to check on Nate, my wonderfully sweet, wonderfully beautiful boy. Standing there I thanked God for this gift he had given me, this gift that began with a great man and a great marriage and which led to this great little boy lying in front of me. And before I feel asleep I couldn't stop thinking about those children I had seen on Oprah. I of course thought about them in my prayers, but all I could ask of God was "Please." I had no other words.

So to go along with my two main missions currently, to save money (in this case, to make money) and to declutter, I have decided to sell a bunch of stuff on eBay.

All those shoes are too small, thanks to a pregnancy which left me with feet a size larger, and those clothes are things I haven't worn in ages and don't really like anyway. Time to get rid of them! My closet is already starting to look better, and I'm excited about moving these things out of my home and hopefully bringing in a little cash!

On one of the blogs I read regularly I came across another blog called Frugal Zeitgeist. I'm really digging her site, but one of the coolest things about her is that she just completely paid off her mortgage. It took her only 6 1/2 years. I find this completely amazing and completely inspiring.

How cool would it be to own your home outright after less than seven years? Instead of scaring myself into budgeting and saving with images of being homeless, maybe I should have an explicit goal I'm working towards, like paying off our mortgage early. Or I could start with something small, like maybe a new dining room table. We may still have a mortgage payment for a while, but at least I'll have a nice table to sit at when I write those checks.

I generally don't follow the news very closely as I rarely have the TV on during the day, and when it comes to being on the internet, my first thought isn't to check what's going on in the world. That changed yesterday.

I had heard a few things here and there over the past few days about the stock market's wild ride. So yesterday morning I logged on to DrudgeReport.com to see what the top stories were for the day. Of course, it was all about the stock market. I read a few different articles, each sounding more doom and gloom than the last. I don't usually get caught up in the these things, as I think I have a fairly high tolerance for risk, plus I recognize that the market has it's ups and downs, but it will always be back up again. Plus, when it's down, all the stocks are on sale, so it's a great time to buy.

But when I started to read things like "the next Great Depression" and "the world as we know it is over", I'll admit, I freaked out a bit.

I kept reading, and tried to remain calm, but all I could picture was me and my little family, homeless, huddled together in a tiny little tent on the outskirts of town.

So in order to calm myself, I decided to go to the mall. No, not to soothe myself or to languish in some serious case of denial, but to return things that have been sitting in my closet, brand new and unused. Things that I didn't really need to begin with. Things that now just glowed with a giant neon-lit sign saying, "You bought this, and you are now leading your family to the poor house."

When Nate and I got to the mall and started walking around, I felt very strange. My heart was beating a little faster than normal, and I felt a slight twinge of panic. But no one else looked panicked. Everyone in the mall looked normal, acted normal. They were strolling along from store to store, laughing with their friends, handing their children snacks, seemingly enjoying this outing to the mall. Didn't they know what was happening? Didn't they know we were facing the next Great Depression? What was wrong with these people? Why were they here shopping, spending money, when soon, who knows, very soon, we may all be in dire straits?

These thoughts were just racing through my head, and for a moment I did consider that I may have lost my mind, but I assured myself that if I even had an inkling that I'd lost my mind, then I probably had not in fact lost my mind. But it was all very disconcerting. So I returned the few things I had brought with me, restrained myself from screaming out that the world was coming to an end, and then calmly drove home.

Luckily, by last night the market had recovered most of what it had lost the last two days, so I was able to relax. This relaxation allowed me to have some clarity. We don't know what tomorrow is going to bring or what the markets will do in the coming months. All we can do is prepare for the worst. And for me, the worst is being homeless and living in a tent.

So the first step, obviously, is to finally, FINALLY, stay within my budget. I'm sure I have many character flaws, but, unfortunately, not always acting responsibly with money is my greatest flaw. This is something I struggle with, but this struggle must be won now.