In my last blog entry I referred to a certain "fit of spirit" I had the other day, largely directed at my husband (poor man). Here's what I was so worked up about: getting a job.

I'm writing about this in this blog because I think that for many women who've been stay-at-home moms there comes a time where they must make a decision about going back to work or continuing to stay home. For me, that decision seems to come up every month! It has been very much on my mind in the past year.

I'd love to have a discussion about this. If you've been fortunate enough to stay at home with your children, when did you go back to work? Why? If you didn't go back to work how did you come to that decision?

Now, for the past 7 1/2 years I've been, for all intents and purposes, a stay-at-home or work-while-the-kids-are-in-school mom. This is a lifetyle decision that we've been very fortunate to be able to choose and it means that although my children have been in school, including preschool, they haven't had to go in before school or after school care. Both boys had very limited childcare up until they were 3 years old, as well. I have also been 90% in charge of housework, cooking, laundry, doctor's appointments, etc. Make that 95%. My husband does A LOT around the house but by and large I do all the routine homemaker type activities. I don't enjoy them much, but someone has to do them, right? And he's bringing home the bacon and mowing lawns and taking the trash to the dump so it's not like he's not contributing.

I also volunteer at my children's schools. This is very important to me as it allows me to get a feel for what's going on.

This lifestyle choice has also allowed me to pursue my dream of being a writer. Because I've had the time to work at it I've now reached the point where I've started to get things published. I've also started my own small press which will be expanding a great deal in the next year (I have 2 new projects and I'm starting an imprint which will have its own projects). My press has the potential to do really well as long as I give it time to expand slowly and the attention it needs to get off the ground.

There is also this blog as well as my Hoping to Adopt blog. Since starting this blog thing in February I've probably spent more time than I should have working on these...but I feel like I'm finally at the point where I can write what I need to write but also limit the amount of time I'm spending. It's a pretty good balance right now.

So - there're those benefits to not working full time, but there are also negatives.

Here's part 2.