What Makes a Good Mother?

Since I have no boss to give me performance reviews, I have come up with my own method to rate my motherhood. I have taken into account that only about a tenth of the brain capacity that I had before children remains. My review is a simply tally of what things I did that day that fall into the good mother category and what falls into the bad mother category. Good mother things are like providing a nutritious snack, singing Wheels on the Bus 10+ times, figuring out a way that all 5 kids can sit on my lap while reading a book to them. Bad mother items are things like Jake finding the heartburn medication, letting them watch Calliou, taking an internet quiz about what kind of ice cream my personality is most like, etc.

This morning was filled with a few bad mother category items so when Caleb wanted to go outside in the snow, how could I say no. I needed to even out the score. It took almost 30 minutes to get the three youngest bundled up. The biggest stumbling block was Jake who didn't think he should wear shoes and managed to get off 2 pairs of shoes and a pair of boots before his mother put his sister's Dora moccasins on. All bundled up we headed outside for some fun. It wasn't as fun as expected and within 30 seconds all three were crying. The fluffy snow of yesterday had disappeared and in its place hard crusty snow with a layer of ice on top and freezing rain coming from the sky. My dilemma: Was this really a good mother moment when all of the kids were miserable?

I was pretty determined to put it in the plus category, so I dragged all 3 to the backyard, entertaining for the neighbors I am sure, and insisted that we were going to play until everyone had fun. We learned that ice snow does make fun sledding, as long as Mom rides down the hill with you. At one point there were three kids and me on this sled.

Luckily, Aly came out and joined us and the others realized that it was okay if mom didn't ride as well.

I think it might end up as a good mother day after all.