A Homemaker’s Diary

The books that I ordered through AcmaMall will arrive in few days time. Can’t wait to check out the Montessori books and the book about motherhood. Will review those books later once I managed to read them all.

Anyway, while bloghopping I found another book: In Praise of Stay-at-Home Moms by Dr. Laura Schlessinger.

I like what one of the readers wrote:

I purchased this book for my daughter, who is juggling a job with three small children. I read it from cover to cover before I passed it on to her. It brought back many poignant memories of my youth, and the attitude in the late ’60s and early ’70s towards being a housewife and “stay-at-home” mom. I think my personal story may bring things in perspective, and support the value of this book.

In the ’60s-70s, the Feminist movement was in full swing. Of course, this movement had its rightful place, as did the Civil Rights movement that ran concurrently to the Feminist platform, since so many women were discriminated against and denied their rights in the workplace. We definitely have to understand the rage that minorities and women experienced when they were denied advantages given the white male majority. That goes without argument.

I am a woman of 60 years. I, too, as Dr. Laura, became a “Feminista” in those years, as I was outraged that women were not given the same guidance and advantages as our male counterparts. However, we were also very much brainwashed into thinking all men were evil and manipulative. We were not taught the joy of a true loving partnership with our husbands. In fact, we were encouraged to be in competition with them!

In that tumultuous time in our history, had I expressed among my friends and associates the desire to just be a loving wife and mother to my family, I would have been denigrated and dismissed. Actually, despite the Feminist movement, I opted for full time motherhood in the early 70s. Despite my happiness at staying home to nurture my children, I always felt embarrassed when I was asked, “Well, what do you DO?” In those days, your position or career determined your worth as a female..NOT your value as a mother.

When my children were in their early teens, I unfortunately became a single mother and was forced to return to the job force. I worked over two decades for a company that summarily dismissed me a few months ago. They found a younger, cheaper version of myself, despite my giving 100 percent to this company for so many years. So much for all the “glory” my career ever brought me. I’m wondering, how many working mothers are toiling for similar companies, who discard them when their usefulness is over?

What fools these mortals be, thinking that their mundane jobs provide self worth? There are exceptions, of course, but I do encourage all those working mothers out there to think about what they truly are contributing to “society” and how much they should be contributing, instead, to their own children.

They might think about this: After a certain age, when their neglected children are adults, they may find, as I did, that my stellar “career” brought me neither fortune or fame. Of course, if you are a famous brain surgeon or space scientist, this may not apply to you. But let’s face it, probably 90 percent of working mothers are employed in jobs like I had, where we are just working stiffs doing our job for the sake of some company and our pay checks.

Finally, and most importantly, what remains of my “stay at home” years is the beautiful relationship I still have with my beloved children. Those years gave me the opportunity to bond and raise them in serenity, with wonderful moments that cannot be described here. In sum, my personal glory (after my significant “career”) is in my dear, well-adjusted children and my grandchildren. My daughter, incidentally, is making great strides in becoming a stay-at-home mom, and I am proud of her!

Of course I realize there are some circumstances that are beyond a mother’s control, and she is forced to work to feed her family. But how many women are out there who are working just for more income to buy that bigger house, those flat-screen TVs, designer clothes, and all those electronic gadgets, etc. etc. etc?

Furthermore, I venture to write that if a woman is so committed to a career that she wishes to devote her entire life to that venture, she should choose, as Kathryn Hepburn did so long ago, not to bring children into the world that she could not personally raise.

I truly commend Dr. Laura for having the courage to tout this new argument to the nation. It is high time. I was a Feminista. I’ve been there, done that, and I know deep in my heart that a mother’s place is with her children. If we could bring every mother back into the home, our country would be in such a better place, removed of so much turmoil because this nation’s children would be infused with love, and not the pain of neglect.

Thank you for allowing me to express this opinion.

Now I know why there are many who are not happy with my decision to be SAHM, they are stuck with the mindset of people in the 60’s and 70’s…haha!

I was bloghopping when I found these articles related to homemaker.

The first one : What’s a homemaker worth? The shocking truth makes me realize that if all the homemakers demand such pay, all the husband will go broke..haha!

They are typically constructed from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics’ average pay figures for a variety of occupations including:

* Child-care worker, $8.91 an hour
* Maid, $8.02 an hour
* Food preparation supervisor, $11.70 an hour
* Bookkeeper, $11.94 an hour
* Chauffeur, $8.67 an hour

The formula is simple. Figure out how many hours, on average, a homemaker performs each task, multiply those hours by the appropriate wage and come up with an impressive and completely overblown annual figure.

Sometimes they don’t even bother to determine working hours. Talk show host and investment adviser Ric Edelman decided that because mothers are constantly on call and perform all these functions, the appropriate figure was one that reflected the hourly rate for each of 17 occupations, performed simultaneously, 24 hours a day, seven days a week. That’s how he came up with an annual worth figure of more than $500,000.

For those who insist on working and let someone else raise your children for you, perhaps you should read this article : Second incomes: twice the work, half the return. I like what the last paragraph says:

Also on the bright side, discovering that a second income really doesn’t contribute much financially can free a spouse to learn new skills, go back to school, pursue an unprofitable dream career or launch a home-based business that may pay little during the first few years. If you’re going to work for free, after all, you might as well enjoy it.

So true!

I think sooner or later I will need to buy a new handbag. The current one is almost torn at the handle..huhu! I made a pledge to myself that I will not buy another handbag until the current one that I’m using daily is really, really in bad shape.

Of course it’s really tempting to splurge on something that costly like a designer handbag but in times like this, I need to be prudent and should only spend on what I really need..but it’s not wrong to dream and imagine of all the good things in life, right?

Who knows if somehow I could be the one who wins this LV Neverfull handbag..heh!

The contest is open to Malaysia and Singapore residents..so women out there, click the banner to enter the contest and see whether you will get this handbag after 31st August..hehe!

I’m off to bed in 10 minutes time (hopefully!) So this will be my quick update for the week.

We went to Subang Parade on Saturday in the attempt to run away from the renovation noise from our SS (go figure the bad word) neighbor..sigh! I don’t understand what took them so long to finish up the renovation…eeii sakit hati la..we were told that the next 2 days there will be more wall hacking..enough about that..

We tried the Tumble Tots Gymbabes session and I was not happy about it. They lack of manpower so I really feel that the RM60 spent for the trial session is such a waste..I might as well get some new educational toy from Toys R Us or a book on parenting and child play for that amount of money that I paid. But at least now I know what’s the Gymbabes is all about.

I think the main reason why I decided not to sign up for their monthly session was because our son didn’t enjoy it. If your kids are hyperactive or the type that always have excess energy, then perhaps this kind of Tumble here and there will suit him/her..heh! Our son is more to laid back type that prefers close attention from his parents. So I think rather than push him to attend such session, I might as well do my own Mama Tots session at home…hehe!

Oh…I’m still in search of good craft pliers for the coming class. We went to Mydin USJ on Friday to get supplies like brushes, scissors etc but somehow they no longer stock up the usual brushes that I bought earlier for decoupage classes..huhu!

For the coming class, I already got a new venue..the one in Kelab Komuniti Taman Tasik Cyberjaya sucks big time! Not worth of RM65 per hour for such lousy service. Hopefully this time it will be better.

Well, that’s it for now! I will update more if I get some time off from the little one..hehe! Happy Monday and have fun working people!

A lot has been happening lately..some I don’t really feel like sharing especially when it’s family related (it’s always a sore subject when it comes to family).

The rest were like our car broke down (battery went dead) just before we headed for a friend’s wedding on Sunday, the weeks before it was air cond problem, and then the previous weeks I was busy with preparation for class and the wedding, and the day before the wedding (on Saturday) we had hard time finding sirih for sirih junjung..isk isk..just as you thought you have planned it all, things happen..huhu!

Nevertheless it all went well for the bride who is also an old friend from school. It’s a second marriage for her after the demise of her first husband..sad huh! But as the song says, patah tumbuh hilang berganti..I’m sure she has thought about it all through..fuhh..not sure how it will be if it was me, will I remarry? Will I stay single and raise the son alone..as of now, I think I will not remarry, but then again what if God has destined for me to have another married life, who knows, right?

Well, this is just some random thoughts that I have in mind today…nothing important in particular. And to leave you all with something pleasing to the eye, here is the picture of sirih junjung that I managed to make with whatever helaian sirih I got from the Indian florist in Puchong..heh!