Tuesday, April 25, 2006

My Mother-in-law, my mother-in-law, face like a bag of spanners...

We had the in-laws for the weekend. It was good fun: we went to sunny Looe on Saturday. Also took them to mum's work and I was very proud of mum. Unfortunately she and S were away as his cousin had died, and they went to the wake in Scotland.

People around us seem to be dropping like flies. Of course, J with skin cancer at 32 was most shocking and upsetting to me. Left a wife and two kids.

M managed to get the fatherly lecture, which I think consisted of telling him to send me out to work :). Fortunately I missed it by going to bed early.

Although perhaps if I'd stayed up, the lecture wouldn't have happened?

It's true that we would be better off if I worked, but I'm not sure the kids would be better off. When the youngest is at pre-school it'll be different, but right now I think he's too young to spend 8 hours a day or whatever in child-care. I don't want to miss out on him either.

It sounds a bit of a traditional view, but it's not rooted in it having to be me as the wife staying at home: either of us would do.

Just lucky it's me! :D

The thing about this kind of talk, is that immediately parents start getting defensive. If you're a stay-at-home mum or dad, you're asked when you're going back to work and treated like you're a person of infinite leisure (or lazy). And if you're a working parent, you worry about spending time with your kids, juggling child-care and feel that your parenting abilities are in question.

I think it's about what works well for each family and have no interest in telling others what's good for them :D.

Currently we are just staying afloat financially and I get to spend a lot of time with the kids.

It's not going to be like this forever.

We have a new plan. We are abandoning getting a new pub for present. The industry is in turmoil and we can't face the upheaval of moving and poor little un having to change schools again. So we are concentrating on getting housing and me trained as a teacher. It's our 2/3 year plan. All I need is my PGCE. If I can do it part-time or a similar course to get me a teaching qualification in the next couple of years, hopefully I'll be ready to start working when the baby is starting pre-school or school. And M will stay in his current work, although he doesn't like it much. But he says that as long as we're working towards something, he can hack it for a couple of years. At which point, he can either go back to pubs, or retrain, or whatever.

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