by specialneedmom2 | Nov 1, 2013 | Being Thankful, Canada, Family, Health, Husband, Kids, Life Lesson, Moving, Parenting, Special Needs, World Motherhood, Younger Children
Parents watch their child grow and exclaim that ‘Time flies!’ Or, on those endless afternoons where the cranky and over tired toddler simply will not nap, time drags on for an eternity.
As former residents of a major city and newcomers to Smalltown, Ontario, we’re adjusting to a different type of time – time without traffic.
Oh sure, we have traffic. Cars, trucks and boats (on trailers) go up and down the streets. And a friend told me about parents of kids at a school in the next town over picking up their kids on snowmobiles, but it’s a different kind of traffic than the choking gridlock that paralyses the Greater Toronto Area on a daily basis.
Our family is adjusting to life without traffic and on a more reasonable timeline, which only highlights how ridiculous our city life was. Two working parents with two kids in two different daycare facilities meant that we had to leave our home by 6:20 am every weekday to make the prerequisite drops just before squeaking into work just on time.
This meant the kids had to be up by 5:30 am to eat breakfast and stumble into clothes for the day. The birds weren’t even up! No wonder my oldest had serious behaviour issues – poor guy was exhausted.
Now as our family has grown to three children ages 6 and under, we’ve streamlined our efforts. One parent stays home, the other goes to work. Oh, and the oldest still has to be at school shortly after 8:00 am. Adding two children with special needs – with different therapist appointments and medical visits, and you have one busy family with serious time management issues. We’d have to drive for about 45 minutes (one way) to make those medical appointments (which were in the same city as we were; only traffic slowed you down to a crawl). So our family got used to leaving to go anywhere about an hour early.
Life in Smalltown, Ontario sure is different. If I drove for 45 minutes here I’d be in another township (or two)! Hubby and I find we do more in less time, and actually enjoy our drive through the town’s streets. A recent major shopping trip (one of those big box adventures, that required you to pick up stuff at other stores because it’s on sale) found Hubby and I sitting down for lunch with our toddler, wondering what to do with the rest of the day. We’d done a month’s worth of shopping in less than three hours, and been at three different stores too!
This is in sharp contrast to our city life, where lunch is a slice of pizza gobbled by kids strapped in car seats as a parent races to the next appointment or errand, all in an effort to save time. I’m not even going to talk about quality of life here. Check out my post, the Busy, Busy Month of May for more on this one. But back to time.
My daily commute is a perfect example of how time creeps away. Last year, for the first time in ten years my commute was under 20 minutes – without traffic. For ten years I’d been driving for an hour or more to work, and an hour or more from work. Around two hours each day, spent in my car. For ten years.
It makes me sick thinking about how much time was wasted, sitting and waiting for the car in front of me to move. Never mind the delays of an accident or construction – even my little 20 minute commute would balloon to over an hour if there was construction. (Which, as GTA residents will tell you, is nearly constant in summer time.) So as a family that has dealt with time-sucking gridlock, we love the freedom and new found time life in Smalltown brings. The kids are happy, parents are happy, we’re all relaxed and so much less stressed.
Some of the things we’ve been doing include:
- Spending time outdoors: Playing in the backyard kiddie pool after school! Playing in the backyard BEFORE school (unheard of!) Enjoying the fresh air and sunshine, instead of watching videos constantly. In the winter we’ll be outside playing in the snow.
- Visiting local Farmer’s Markets, Pow Wows and festivals.
- Becoming active in the community – the library, museum, YMCA and Sports Complex and Ontario Early Years Centre are only a short walk away.
I just signed up the oldest for Boy Scouts (Beavers, actually for his age group) and my daughter for dance classes – all on weeknights, and all only a short drive or walk away. I wouldn’t even dream of this in the city. We’re doing more, with less.
In short, we’re living life, on our own time.
What do you do to save time or make the best use of your time in your day?
Angela blogs about her super-powered, special needs family at halfpastnormal. They’re recently moved from Toronto, Canada to a small town in Ontario.
Toronto traffic jam photo credit to James D. Schwartz. This photo has a creative commons attribute license.
Angela is a Special Education teacher who blogs about her super-powered special needs family. She has a 3 year old with Prader-Willi Syndrome and a 5 year old with Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy and Sensory Processing Disorder. The odds of these random genetic events occurring at the same time are astronomical. "When you add our typically developing one year old baby boy to the mix, you have a very busy household!", she explains.
Angela admits to having too many appointments, too many school problems, and being generally too busy as she tries to live life to the fullest. Please visit her family at Half Past Normal for more of their adventures! If you want to connect to chat, you can find her on Twitter @specialneedmom2
If you are interested in Special Education policies and procedures in Ontario – or just some excellent strategies and accommodations – please check out Angela's other site at Special Ed on the Bell Curve.
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by Wall Street Mama (USA) | May 17, 2013 | Child Care, Family, Health, Home, Husband, Kids, Life Balance, Motherhood, Parenting, Working Mother, World Motherhood, Younger Children
I made my first guest contribution to the World Moms Blog about two years ago. My article focused on being a “busy bee,” and managing working, motherhood and household duties. I wrote about energy, dedication to my career and “getting it all done,” even though I knew the workload was hard. At that point in time, my son had just turned one. Well, flash forward to 2013 and my son will be three in a few weeks and my daughter will be one in two months. There is only one word that comes to mind – Exhaustion! (more…)
Wall Street Mama was born and raised in the suburbs of Chicago and moved to NJ when she was a teenager. She fell in love with New York City and set her mind to one thing after college – working on Wall Street. She has spent the last 16 years working on the trading floor at three major banks. As an Institutional Salesperson, she is responsible for helping large corporations and money funds invest their short term cash in the fixed income part of the market. She lives in the suburbs of central NJ with her husband of 11 years, their amazing 21 month old boy and their first baby – a very spoiled Maltese. She has baby #2 on the way and is expecting a little girl in June 2012. She is a full time working mother and struggles with “having it all” while wondering if that is even possible.
Wall Street Mama was married at the age of 25 but waited to have children because she felt she was too focused on her career which required a lot of traveling and entertaining. When she was finally ready, she thought she could plan the exact month she was ready to have a child, like everything else she planned in her life. She was shocked and frustrated when things did not go according to her plan. Fast forward four years later, after a miscarriage and several rounds of failed fertility injections, her little miracle was conceived naturally. She never thought in a million years, that she and her husband would be in their late 30’s by the time they had their first child.
Since the financial crisis of 2008, she has endured some of the most difficult years of her life. The stress of trying to conceive was combined with some of life’s biggest challenges. She and her husband, who is a trader, both lost their jobs on Wall Street the exact same month. Her mother was diagnosed with terminal cancer and she ended up passing away while she was 6 months pregnant. At times it didn’t seem like things would ever get better, but she has learned that life is cyclical and what comes down must again go up.
Leaving her baby boy with a wonderful nanny each day is difficult, but at times it is easier than she would have expected. She still enjoys the seemingly addictive draw of working on Wall Street. The past few years have been dramatically different from the “good days” but she is focused on trying to achieve what she once had before. She is currently working on launching her own blog, Wall Street Mama, in an attempt to guide others who are focused on continuing their career, yet struggle with leaving their little ones at home. She is weathering the ups and downs of the market and motherhood, one day at a time.
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by Wall Street Mama (USA) | Jul 26, 2011 | Guest Post, Motherhood, USA, Working Mother
Buzzzz…….Buzzzz…… It is 5 a.m., and my alarm clock just buzzes away. I hit snooze one too many times, and I have that same thought cross my mind as it does every morning. I wish I could call out of work today…… But, I never do.
I have been working on Wall Street for over 15 years, and something in my nature always keeps me going.
I commonly refer to myself as a “worker bee.” The worker bee in me has been married for eleven years, waited to have a baby for six years and then went through another three years of trying before our little miracle was conceived.
I pat myself on the back when I tell people I never took a single sick day while pregnant as an example of dedication to my job.
I also continued my typical schedule during the entire pregnancy of going to bed at midnight and waking up at 5 a.m. How do I do it? Why do I do it? When will I stay home with my baby? These are the common questions I hear from friends and family at functions, parties and holiday get-togethers. (more…)
Wall Street Mama was born and raised in the suburbs of Chicago and moved to NJ when she was a teenager. She fell in love with New York City and set her mind to one thing after college – working on Wall Street. She has spent the last 16 years working on the trading floor at three major banks. As an Institutional Salesperson, she is responsible for helping large corporations and money funds invest their short term cash in the fixed income part of the market. She lives in the suburbs of central NJ with her husband of 11 years, their amazing 21 month old boy and their first baby – a very spoiled Maltese. She has baby #2 on the way and is expecting a little girl in June 2012. She is a full time working mother and struggles with “having it all” while wondering if that is even possible.
Wall Street Mama was married at the age of 25 but waited to have children because she felt she was too focused on her career which required a lot of traveling and entertaining. When she was finally ready, she thought she could plan the exact month she was ready to have a child, like everything else she planned in her life. She was shocked and frustrated when things did not go according to her plan. Fast forward four years later, after a miscarriage and several rounds of failed fertility injections, her little miracle was conceived naturally. She never thought in a million years, that she and her husband would be in their late 30’s by the time they had their first child.
Since the financial crisis of 2008, she has endured some of the most difficult years of her life. The stress of trying to conceive was combined with some of life’s biggest challenges. She and her husband, who is a trader, both lost their jobs on Wall Street the exact same month. Her mother was diagnosed with terminal cancer and she ended up passing away while she was 6 months pregnant. At times it didn’t seem like things would ever get better, but she has learned that life is cyclical and what comes down must again go up.
Leaving her baby boy with a wonderful nanny each day is difficult, but at times it is easier than she would have expected. She still enjoys the seemingly addictive draw of working on Wall Street. The past few years have been dramatically different from the “good days” but she is focused on trying to achieve what she once had before. She is currently working on launching her own blog, Wall Street Mama, in an attempt to guide others who are focused on continuing their career, yet struggle with leaving their little ones at home. She is weathering the ups and downs of the market and motherhood, one day at a time.
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