Why My Family Is Wrinkly

In one of my recent posts I made a casual mention of my lack of ironing skills. That comment shocked a couple of people who – gasp! – couldn’t believe I don’t iron my family’s clothes.

The reason is two-fold – 1) I hate ironing because it’s the most tedious chore ever, and 2) I do a really lousy job at it. The ironing board only gets pulled out twice a year – when Mr. P needs to iron his suit for Christmas and Easter services.

My ironing failure is the complete opposite of my mother who would spend hours on weekends watching QVC and ironing load after load of jeans and sweatshirts. I mean, the woman ironed pillowcases for goodness’ sake. But what came of her work? We still came in from outside with wrinkles in our shirts, holes in our jeans, and snot and Popsicle in our hair.

It’s because of things like this – the extra effort and extra touches my mom put into everything she did – that make me feel I’m not fulfilling my motherly duties each day. After talking with some fellow mommies, I found out I’m not the only one who wishes she could accomplish what her mother did.

Said Amy, mother of a 4-year-old and 1-year-old, “I don’t grow a garden (wish I did), can, make elaborate breakfasts, sew anything other than buttons when I’m really on top of it, or bake homemade desserts other than for special occasions.”

She broke it down for two reasons – time and knowledge. “I want to give some of these things a try when the kids are older.”

Here’s just a sample of the basic survival skills at which my mother exceled but I falter:

• I don’t wrap presents – If it’s a standard shirt box, I’m golden. But if it’s anything else, the edges will be blobs of scotch-taped madness and I’ll end up a blubbering mess of failure by December 24. My mom put special touches, like curlicues and ribbons, on presents; my special touches are teardrops and the gin I spill in frustration.
   
• I don’t sew – The night before my 10-year high school reunion, Mr. P stayed up all hours of the night emergency hemming a pair of capris. Why? Because I have no idea how to hem a pair of pants or sew a button – to the point I will go buttonless for weeks if I can’t get to the tailor. And by the way, to Mrs. K, my eighth-grade home ec teacher, I’m not the only one that sewed the elastic into my Class of ’95 fleece bike shorts, I had to turn to Mama P in desperation.
   
• I don’t do hair – MJ regularly asked for hairdos and braids like her other friends. Unfortunately, she has two options – a bumpy ponytail or down with her bangs pulled back. It would be lovely to do a cute little French braid every morning so she didn’t end up with her entire lunch in her tendrils every day, but the one time I braided it, her sad-looking braid resembled the tail on Dallas, Barbie’s golden palomino from 1980.

Another level to my inferiority complex – my lack of sentimentality. Mr. P and I never bought baby books or saved hair from the girls’ first haircuts. Our photographs are just thrown in a dresser drawer along with the girls’ art projects. I don’t think I’m cold-hearted, just overwhelmed.

My friend Natalie is in the same boat. “My mom sent over a huge scrapbook with every card (Halloween, birthday, Christmas) I had received between the ages of birth and five. Plus, art projects, school programs, etc.”

Natalie does save the work of her five-year-old and three-year old on a corkboard, but admits there’s “Just no time to organize it in a book or even digitally! We did pick up a few file boxes and when the corkboard wall is overflowing, we thin it out. BUT it just stays in the box.”

When I start feeling not up to snuff, I have to remind myself over and over – things aren’t the same as they were 30 years ago. Today, whether we’re stay-at-home-moms, work-from-home moms or work-outside-the-home moms, we’re pulled in a million directions each day and sometimes we just have to sit back and let certain things slide, even if that means we iron once a year.

So those weekdays when MJ heads to school in a wrinkly skirt with lopsided pigtails and a belly full of Fruit Loops rather than homemade whole grain pancakes, I have to remind myself that instead of running around in a panic, we got to spend 20 precious minutes in the morning snuggling on the couch while reading a book or singing along to Glee – something my overachieving mom would be proud of.

By Nicole Plegge, Lifestyle Blogger for SmartParenting