What You Should Really Be Doing in the New Year

Photo courtesy of Meysenburg Photography

Before I was a work-at-home-mom, before I was a work-away-from-the-home mom in non-profit, before I was even a mom at all, I started my career in advertising.

The account I worked on marketed a product aimed at moms, and we always talked about how the seasons affected mom and her frame of mind.

While the entire world is screaming “New Year, New You!” right now, in all actuality, mom’s New Year began months ago with the start of school. She has zero interest in transforming herself right now.  She’s tired.  She’s busted her buns making the last few weeks amazing for her family, sprinkling extra love and effort into everything from homemade Christmas morning cinnamon rolls to perfectly wrapped gifts to make sure those holiday moments were magical, and now she wants a break.

And, now in this life, as a mom of three (with my oldest only being three-and-a-half), when I’m talking about she, I really mean me.

I’m totally that mom that we used to spend hours discussing.  How does she grocery shop? Does she meal plan? How many times a week does she cook? Is she scratch-cooking or box-cooking?  How many children does she have, and how does she spend her time? What income bracket is she in, and how do we get her to buy our product?

This she/me wants to throw some soup in the crock pot right now, cozy up under a blanket by the fire, and take a friggin’ nap – one where I wake up when I’m well-rested, not one I’m awakened from because everyone’s up from naptime, needs to be nursed/needs a snack/needs a drink/needs a diaper change/needs me.

It’s actually one of the things I want to be better at this year.

When you’re self-employed, it’s incredibly hard to turn off work.  If you don’t conquer each and every line on the to-do list, it’s not like someone’s covering for you and your workload just diminishes when you take a bit of time off. It actually just piles up because there is no one else. Because of this, I find myself putting work first before the things I want to do because there is always something else I should be working on.  Client photos get edited before my personal photos.  Sessions are blogged before my family’s latest stories are shared.  My evenings are spent in front of a computer screen instead of next to my husband. And after not-so-long, I find myself resentful. I’m grateful for the “problem” of being busy with work, but still struggling to find the right balance.

I think this is pretty common for a lot of moms, whether you work-at-home, stay-at-home, or work-out-of-the-house. When you’re a mom, every day is a work day, regardless of your “work” status.  There’s always laundry to be washed, dried, folded and put away – always mouths that need to be fed.

You know the saying, “If mama’s not happy, ain’t nobody happy.”

Mamas. Get some happy in 2016!!!

Learn to let yourself relax and take a break. Do something for you.  I know it’s hard (it is) and feels selfish (it’s not).  It is so, so necessary for your mental health.

  • Read a book that isn’t about sleep behaviors, sibling rivalry, discipline, or homework habits.
  • Get your husband to agree to a night off.  (Be sure to clarify that this is actually different than a night out.  A night OUT gets you a few hours away from the house, which we can all agree is great.  But it doesn’t mean that you’ll come home to a clean house, toys put away, backpacks lined up by the back door.  You were out, but not off.  A night OFF means he’s covering for you and handling all the mom things you do day-in and day-out without wavering.  Get a night off.)
  • Meet a friend for a pedi.
  • Spend nap time cozied up on the couch with the latest issue of Domino instead of scrubbing toilets or prepping for dinner or working like a mad woman in front of a glowing screen the moment you shut the door to your little cherubs’ rooms praying they all sleep for at least two hours…simultaneously.  (Is that too much to ask?!)
  • Don’t spend all of your babysitter funds on date night, and use some to go sit at a coffee shop ALONE for an hour.
  • Take a walk.
  • Go to a bookstore and look at really pretty coffee table books and feel inspired.  (And maybe a little bit jealous that in those houses all the pretty things are actually on the coffee table, and no one is touching them with sticky fingers.  Or breaking them.)
  • Go to Target.  ALONE.

Enjoy this season of retreat to recharge. Soon the seasons will shift, and you’ll be in the homestretch to the end of your year…sweet summertime when the livin’ is easy.

Alison Moore
Alison Moore has been growing roots in Wichita for over seven years now with her high school sweetheart turned husband, Andrew, and their three kids, three and under. She's a work-at-home mom that spends naptime editing away the beautiful families she captures through her premiere photography business and is constantly battling an overflowing laundry basket and too much dog hair on the hardwoods. She's blogged for the better half of a decade transparently sharing the natural ebbs and flows of life. She spends a lot of time wishing she'd gone to bed earlier the night before and traveling to Manhattan to brainwash her offspring to love K-State. So far it's working.