Why aren't there enough hours in the day? Like seriously, if only I didn't have to sleep, I think that I may actually scratch the surface of the volume of work that I have to try and get through!

I literally wake in the morning, and if discovered that I have slept in until like 8am (due unusually tired kiddies), I chastise myself all day for wasting those precious hours between 5am and 8am which I find to be the most productive time for me to work in!

With school holidays now coming to an end, and with this in mind, I have decided to throw my hands in the air and shreak "Bugger it!". Tomorrow, Saturday, I am going to close the shop for the day. I simply must get some bookwork done and I am literally drowning in my office amid new products that simply won't sell themselves if I don't hurry up can get them up on the website!

Then, we have to consider the whole "modern day mum guilt" trip that most of us mums find ourselves shouldered with in this day and age. We are much more independent and forward thinking than our predecessors and there are few of us now who are or would be content to simply being a "stay at home mum". By the same token, there are those of us who feel the burden of guilt for not helping to pay the bills if we do take on that role.

So, here it is, this is what we, as mums in the year 2009 have to wade through on a daily basis....

a) guilt for staying at home and not contributing to the bills OR

b) guilt for staying at home and "wasting" our hard-earned educations on being a "housewife" OR

c) guilt for going out and working and contributing to the bills but putting our kids in day care OR

d) guilt for building a work at home business so that we can stay at home with the kids, and then finding ourselves still not spending enough quality time with them anyways! That reliance on the dreaded box in the lounge room that turns our kids into zombies is something that most of us would be embarrassed to admit OR

e) possibly worst of all, more GUILT, when none of the above seemingly succeeds and we find that we are still struggling financially, and emotionally to maintain a happy, healthy household! When despite our efforts, lack of sleep, hoarse throats from yelling at the kids, ingrained fear to answer the phone in case it is someone demanding money, more lack of sleep, putting on the daily facade that you are uber-organised, hyper-confident and of course, SUPREMELY happy with the situation!

Phew! So, where do the Dads fit in here?! The always hard-working, ever-loving, selfless (cough!) dads who head out to work in the morning with their lunches neatly packed and clothes nicely ironed, only to return 9 hours later to a lovely meal on the table, a house full of smiling kids, all ready for bed with hair neatly brushed and freshly bathed. Oh, and not to forget to be greeted by the smiling mum (hiding her true feelings behind the aforementioned facade) waiting with arms opened wide for that welcome home hug and kiss...

Oh, wait, I digressed into my little fantasy world there for a moment... Because, in my house, my poor, long suffering hubby runs out the door each morning, late for work, usually leaves his lunch of a can of tinned tuna and a half squashed banana on the bench, whilst the kids are fighting in the background over a missing Nintendo DS and the baby sits in the corner, wearing half a jar of vegemite on his face and chowing down on the apple core that he just retrieved from the bin.

Me, running around in my jammies (or sometimes the clothes I had on the day before if I fell asleep at the computer!), yelling at kids to go to school cause they are late AGAIN (we live NEXT DOOR to the school, I kid you not, and are ALWAYS late!).

He returns in the afternoon, not to the scene that I illustrated above but rather one where I shove a baby into his arms before he even puts his bag down, am STILL wearing my pjs, whilst on the phone to the courier reminding him to come by and pic up web orders for dispatch the next morning. I'll have a pen in one hand signing permission slips for swimming or excursions for school, phone on my shoulder, and stirring a (now burning) dinner at the same time, whilst still listening to the perpetual white noise of the kids fighting in the background (now over who's turn it is to have the first shower that night!).

So, when I look at it that way, it makes me sit back and take stock that not only do us mums do the hard yards, but our partners do to, although rarely, do I find myself acknowleging it!

So the scenes above are pretty normal in our house, but haven't been the case of late. My partner hasn't been at work for 12 weeks and during this time, he has become quite the Daddy Day Care! During this time, we have set up and opened our new store, where I am sitting right now as I type this. He is at home, with all five of our kids, cleaning chook poo out of our back yard! For the past few weeks I have had him running to the post office, doing washing, mopping floors, cooking dinner, bringing the baby in for midday feeds and more!

BUT, alas, come Monday, I am really fearful that the proverbial you-know-what is going to hit the fan! Why? Well, by dear hubby is returning to work! And what kind of jackpot did we hit for his first roster? Well, one that has him working on the exact days that our 3 yo DOESN'T go to day care! Woohoo!

So, next week, as the older kids head back to school, and parents all over QLD breath their collective sighs of relief, I am going to find myself cooped up in our little 43sqm shop with a rambuncious 3yo, a 13 month old who is obsessed with my EFTPOS machine (oh, yes, we have EFTPOS again!) and pulling out all stops to keep them from chowing down on our organic lollipops and putting their sticky little mits all over those gorgeous new toys I am yet to price and put on the shelves.

Therefore, in saying all of this, I hereby claim the right to combine a-e above and come up with a brand new category as follows:

f) guilt for going out to work, building a business that is still not contributing to paying the bills, bringing a dreaded zombie box into my "organic" shop AND possibly resorting to feeding my kids cold baked beans on toast for dinner for a week!

I promise though, that I won't wear my pyjamas whilst doing so...

tan.