Strollerderby : stay at home moms

5-Minute Time Out: Dr. Penelope Leach

editors — Thu, 07 May 2009 19:45:00 GMT

Today on Babble:

5-Minute Time Out: Dr. Penelope Leach

by Ada Calhoun.

Working parents are in an "impossible situation," confirms childcare expert Penelope Leach.

Read it here.

Stay At Home Moms Worth $122,000

JeanneSager — Thu, 07 May 2009 15:29:00 GMT

I was recently accused of inciting a mommy war between the "stay at homes" and the "working mothers." I honestly out-right guffawed. Because as a working mom who spends part of her time working from home, I've always felt sort of betwixt and between. And respected the heck out of both sides!

Not to mention the list of stay at home dads and working dads I know (including some of my fellow 'Derby writers).

And now to show all you stay-at-home full-timers how much I think you're worth, a little math from Salary.com. In the "real" world, you'd be raking in six figures.

Based on ten daily functions described by a survey of some twelve thousand stay-at-home moms (why they didn't include dads I don't know - those numbers are growing!), the average stay-at-homer should be earning $122,732 a year. In other words - that's what they'd be paying someone else to do all of those duties.

The reason I love this number? Because everytime one of my stay-at-home mom friends tells me she feels like she should kowtow to her working partner, I can throw it at her. See, you're not just worth something as a human being. You're also worth something in the world of family finance.

My biggest contention has always been that those of us who work out of the home usually PAY someone to watch our children. So a stay-at-home mom or dad is saving the family that money.

Then throw in how many more take away meals are consumed in families where both partners work (because as Keri noted the other day, the finances weigh out - it's cheaper to cook it than to buy it). Ironically, several comments left on Keri's post came from parents who don't believe a baking parent's time is worth anything special. This survey begs to differ.

The Salary.com survey goes on to list eight other occupations filled by a stay-at-home parent, including "housekeeper, computer operator, facilities manager, van driver, psychologist, laundry machine operator, janitor and chief executive officer."

The survey puts a working parent's "at home" salary around $76,184. You have to tack on their actual wages to come up with a fair number - but I'd reckon you then have to subtract daycare, take away meals, etc.

So who's better? Neither one. And I say that as a betwixt and between parent. We're all just doing what works for us. But we're all worth something - just ask our kids.

Image: More4Kids

Also on Babble:

Back-to-School: Is It Always Cause for Celebration?

Jen Chaney — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 12:28:00 GMT

It's Labor Day. If your kids haven't already gone back to school, their first day is likely tomorrow. Which, if conventional wisdom can be believed, means moms and dads across America are celebrating. But is that really true?

We all remember that classic Staples commercial, where the father romps merrily through the school supply aisle to the tune of "It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year." Indeed, for stay-at-home moms and dads, there probably is some relief that the kids won't be underfoot 24-7. But some moms and dads out there have to be a little sad at back-to-school time, right?

It means another summer has ended, that money must be spent on backpacks and No. 2 pencils, that all the fun times with the kids -- sculpting sandcastles at the beach, cheering at Saturday morning swim meets or seeing a matinee of "Wall*E" -- must now be replaced by making sure the homework gets done and changing over the family wardrobe from shorts to (shudder) sweaters.

I don't even have a kid of school-age, but I always feel a little depressed every time I see that first back-to-school ad. If nothing else, it's a stark reminder that time is marching on. And as someone famous once said, "The passing of time is monumentally sucky."

Okay, no one famous ever said that. But I think that statement is both true and enormously insightful. (Go ahead, Barack Obama. Feel free to borrow that one for your next big speech. I'll even let you take the credit.)

Parents of America, I ask you: Is back-to-school a time to rejoice, a time to weep, a time to do a little of both? Or is it a time to read posts like this one and wonder who the heck has time to write crap like this when there's so much to do to get ready for back-to-school, you stupid nitwit blogger? Share your thoughts -- and suggestions about where to purchase a reasonable pack of graph paper (do kids still use graph paper?) -- in the comments section below.

Stay at Home Moms Now More Housebound?

Rachael Brownell (Redsy) — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 22:07:00 GMT

According to a CNN report, the economy is requiring more stay at home moms to stay home rather than go on outings or playgroups or employ other methods of insuring sanity stays in tact.

With the high cost of fuel and food, more women who aren't working are also experiencing more isolation as they choose to combine trips and errands to save money.

Jen Singer is says stay-at-home moms are good at living frugally but are fearful of their partner's losing their jobs, since worrying about job loss in a one-income family is... "much more frightening" than for dual income families.

Some economists are wondering if more people are opting out of the workforce as the costs of working become higher. Whatever the case, families living on only one income are having to become more frugal in order to survive.

10 Ways to Embrace Family Budgeting

5 (Free) Ways to Enjoy the Last Lazy Days of Summer

What is mommy worth?

Brett Singer — Wed, 07 May 2008 13:35:00 GMT

This story pops up every now and then. The question is: how much would mom get paid if her job were in the private sector?

The Daily News reports on a study from MomConnection that has come up with a number for moms in New York. And… drum roll please…

$70,000 a year.

They came up with this amount using data from the web site salaryexpert.com.

As for what the women surveyed think they should get if they were to receive a yearly salary, "34% said $100,000, 31% said $50,000, 27% said $75,000 and 8% said $25,000." Man, I'd like to meet the women who said $25,000. Cheap date.

I say "women" because this survey was specifically about stay at home moms. I'm not crying discrimination or anything like that but it still surprises me how often articles like this read as if they were written in the 1950's.

Here's the best part (a quote from someone at MomConnection):

These are Generation Y moms in their 20s and early 30s who made a considered choice to become mothers…They are less likely to feel annoyed or to be whiny."

Oh! I see. As opposed to the whiny wimmen of Generation X, the Baby Boomers, and everyone who came before. Weren't they annoying? All that, "Wah! I want respect! I want equal pay! I'm whiny!" They didn't make a choice to become mothers. They were forced into it, right? (Grrr…)

So – I ask you, the readers. How would you respond? What do you think the salary for a mother should be? Or is what a mother does, to paraphrase the MasterCard ads, priceless?

image: The Daily News

What's a Mommy Wars Foot Soldier to do?

Madeline Holler — Wed, 30 Apr 2008 22:03:00 GMT

There's a new Mommy Wars book on the market, this one issuing an order to cease and desist with all the trivial fighting between working and lounging mothers. Opting In: Having a Child Without Losing Yourself, has a "Calgon, take me away" title, but it's written by feminist author Amy Richards so, you know, it's surely not all about the power of the mani-pedi.

However! As a ground soldier in the Mommy Wars, having been stopped-lossed with my second kid just as things were easing up with the first, I have to say I was taken aback with this description of the book's aim, as summarized by an interviewer who spoke to the author on Salon:

If motherhood is going to be a less harried and more equal enterprise, she suggests, it has to be about more than changing diapers. It has to be about changing ourselves.

Well, see, I don't want to change myself so much.

Sure, I'm an imperfect mess. And I can accept that. But after seven years and two tours of duty -- with no end in sight -- I would submit that change starts -- or at least picks up -- outside the home, not within it.

I'm not asking "society" to fetishize my kids. No, I don't want you to fill in for me -- just one more time -- while I run out for a soccer game and ballet performance. But I would like this culture of personal responsiblity over societal obligations to change just enough that let's me and my husband (and you and your partner) work and have a family and afford a house and good -- no, we'll settle for decent -- schools for the kids and, for God's sake, some fucking affordable, flexible, quality (and, yes, I mean subsidized) childcare for the babies, all babies, and preschoolers, each and everyone that wants some!

I think that would go a long way in letting women decide for themselves -- as the author encourages -- what they want. Because there would be actual options available to the masses. I would submit that work/career issues are the catalyst for all the personal shit that can take over our new lives as parents.

Here's what Richards says:

When I titled the book "Opting In," I meant to say, opt in to your own life, make yourselves aware of the options that are available to you. Because I think women approach motherhood rather passively and just let it happen instead of seeing themselves as the active agents they are or could be. So I have chapters about our relationships with our friends and mothers, as well as our husbands or our same-sex partners. I'm trying to show how parenting affects all aspects. Assuming it only affects the workplace trivializes how much parenting takes over our whole lives.

I haven't read the book and maybe she's all over the idea that women with the biggie jobs have more options than those who don't. In which case, yay. And maybe her book really isn't coaching us on evenly splitting housework (the LEAST of my worries). I hope her take on the Mommy Wars conflict winds up being less about me, the mom, and more about us, all of us, the adults -- the ones who make stuff happen, the ones who are in charge.

What do you think? Does our culture keep us in the trenches, fighting battle after battle in an unwinnable war? Or am I being a big baby?

Photo: defenselink.mil

What Does This Generation of Moms Want?

Kelly Mills — Fri, 08 Feb 2008 17:39:00 GMT

There's about a thousand headlines trying to define what moms of this generation want. Do we hope to return to the domestic spheres of the 1950's housewives (as has been reported), or are we career-minded? Do we care about our jobs or our kids? And one writer says we don't know what we want. When she works fulltime she can't wait to be home with family, but when she is on maternity leave she finds she hates staying at home. She gets a work-from-home freelance career but misses office action, and when she goes back to the office she chafes at the set hours that make her miss her kids. In short, women of this day and age have no idea what they want. What they really, really want.

I actually know what women want. Every woman really wants...A pony. Can I have a pony? A nice Shetland?

Sigh. If I had to hazard a crazy guess, I'd venture that women really want to feel fulfilled and satisfied at whatever they do whenever they are doing it, be it time with kids or the office grind or the freelance life. They'd also like financial security and crap like that. And that it's hard to balance many priorities, and the balance probably looks different for different people, making it impossible to (gasp) find one way to define an entire group of women, except with very broad strokes. I don't mean to Myspace the party here, but I'd also guess men want the same damn thing. It's a generation of people wanting to feel like they are engaged in meaningful things, which of course makes us sooooo very different from previous generations. It's just that our choices were more limited in the past, but I'd be surprised to find we have become suddenly impossible to please.

Judgment Day: Raising Resilient Kids Means Leaving Them Alone

Karen Murphy — Fri, 08 Feb 2008 16:03:00 GMT

Okay, a show of hands here: how many of you have had your kids in day care? And how many of you stayed home and played with your kids? (no judgment either way.)

Okay, next question: do you have clingy-ish kids or adaptable kids?

Anecdotal evidence suggests that kids grow up to be more resourceful, resilient, adaptable, and independent if they're left alone.

Case in point: I stayed home with kids #2 and 3 and now they come to me and wail, "What can I dooooooooo?", expecting me to somehow magically entertain them because that's what I did when they were smaller. Like All.The.Time. Kid #1 was in day care and was content to play on her own a good bit of the time and kid #4, an early preschool-goer, is pretty cool about being on his own. And I've talked to other parents who've had similar experiences with multiple kids, and in every case it was the kids who got 24/7 attention that turned out clingy while the kids who had babysitters and multiple caregivers became more independent. So there must be something to this.

This isn't a working-parent vs. stay-at-home parent thing. This is a letting-kids-find-their-own-way vs. feeling-you-have-to-do-and-be-everything for them thing. It's a lesson I wish I saw coming much earlier, as I sort of created a monster (three of them) while doing what I thought was the best thing. I mean, we all want what's best for our kids! It's just that having a parent 24/7 might not be that best thing, you know? Who knew?

So the time has come to wean them away, to unpeel them from my legs. Have any of you gone through this process, either by choice or circumstance? How did it work out?

Photo: www.steppingstoneslearning.org

Researchers Say Young Kids Don't Make You Happier; Parents Say, "Duh"

Kelly Mills — Thu, 13 Dec 2007 21:28:00 GMT

A new study has found that when it comes to a sense of satisfaction with life, it's your job that makes you feel good, not your kids. Men reported the highest rates of happiness when they had a full-time job, and women with kids were just happy with any hours worked. But young kids? Did not make folks any happier. Hmmm, why would going to a job where you can actually accomplish things all productive-like make us feel more satisfied than having children, whose very existence thwarts all productivity and who can manage to make even the most high-powered take charger feel inadequate? Plus, when you compare the pay scales for the two... Gee, I have no idea.

Actually, it wasn't just that people reported kids did not increase their contentment: In fact, the lowest rates of satisfaction were reported by women with kids under the ages of 3-4, and men with kids under 5 were least stoked. In other words, having li'l rugrats makes us less happy, at least until they go off to school. Know what I think? Between sleeplessness, tantrums, battles over getting dressed and biting other kids at the park, and the need to actually do things with a recalcitrant child or two in tow, well, parenting is HARD. But of course we loooove the little demons, and if you can survive those early years, I think it does get better and eventually more satisfying. Either that or go out and get a real full-time job for some break time.

Stay-at-Home-Dads Raising Dumb Sons

Madeline Holler — Thu, 29 Nov 2007 22:39:00 GMT

Have I got some fuel for the Daddy Wars! (As a battle-weary veteran of the Mommy Wars – breast is best! breast is best! – I feel fully within my rights to fan the flames on the paternal frontlines).

Forget about this guy who pulled the classic competi-mommy tactic of appealing to parents’ sense of responsibility and questioning their devotion to precious offspring. What really works in parenting wars are statistics. Like these:

A large-scale survey of stay-at-home dad’s offspring shows that sons of said career-leavers are slower and less ready for school than other children. (Ka-pow!) As if men who chose to stay at home weren’t emasculated enough by their society and, often, peers, here’s the worst of the news: their daughters were just fine. (Doh! Who wants a dumb son?)

Said one concerned researcher: "We should not simply assume that children will be unaffected by the dismantling of traditional gender roles but consider their needs, as well as those of their parents."

Indeed! (Hang on, the casserole’s done and my happy, smart girly-girls are hungry!)

Okay, where was I. Oh! Mom’s stay home for a reason, Dad’s stay home because they’re bad role models for their boys.

Searching for reasons, the article sites a likely lack of breastfeeding if Mom works and Dad doesn’t. (See, didn’t I SAY breast is best!) And also, Booboo misses his mommy.

“There might be ‘harmful emotional effects’ from the absence of a mother. These effects may be magnified if maternal absence is due to employment that increases tiredness and stress, and hence reduces a mother's sensitivity to a child's needs."

Nothing in the survey showed whether the poor, idiot sons eventually caught up in school. Also, no word on what exactly constituted school readiness. But who cares. It’s ammo for the battle, and this Mom wants to win! (Wait, what are the stakes again?)

Perpetuating the Mommy Wars

Karen Murphy — Wed, 22 Aug 2007 18:48:00 GMT

Hello, I thought we were done with this. I guess I was wrong. But there's something about this piece over at The Imperfect Parent trashing stay-at-home moms who complain abut their lives and the judgment they receive that rubs me the wrong way. Is it possible I am looking for someone else to make me feel good about myself, because I have been a stay-at-home mom (and now a work-at-home mom, woo) for the past 12 years and have no self-esteem as a result?

Probably, at least according to the Imperfect Parent piece.

After all, we all derive our identities from our jobs, don't we? (<-- sarcasm) And if our jobs are [in the eyes of others] nothing but wiping butts and noses, guess what that makes us??

Yeah, yeah, I know. You can feel fulfilled by staying at home and raising children. I should know, I did it. And it was fulfilling, for awhile.

But I beg to differ with the premise that the feeling of being judged, that so many SAHMs perceive, is of their own making. I know first-hand that many husbands, for instance, regard wiping butts and noses and cooking and cleaning as something less than, WAY less than, earning actual money from an actual job. And if you don't get respect at home, you're not going to get it from the wider world, trust me. Oh sure, you can say, "Well, many working moms would give their eyeteeth/right arms/first-born to stay at home like YOU GET TO DO [you lazy complaining person who doesn't know a good thing when it's RIGHT THERE IN HER LAP], but they don't get to. And they would TOTALLY appreciate the opportunity, too (unlike you). So why don't YOU get a job and let some OTHER MOM stay at home??!"

The fact is, we all make choices. Some of us feel less freedom, or have less freedom, to make those choices. Some moms and of course dads have to work or want to work. That's fine. Some can stay home. That's fine too. But seriously, neither situation is completely ideal, is it? If you work you can derive satisfaction from being rewarded in a tangible way for something you did. But you often don't have time to be with the people you love. If you stay home, there's less of a tangible reward (unless you are counting kisses and hugs, which of course are wonderful but are more difficult to use when paying the bills, and frankly, I expect them whether I work outside the home or not) but more opportunity for meaningful interaction with people you love. There's no one right way to be a parent.

In my Happy Bubble Land, we would all feel supported for our choices, and we would all have the ability to choose the lifestyle that really made us feel fulfilled and happy while affording financial opportunities as well.

But until that happens, I totally reserve the right to bitch once in awhile about my life and I grant you the right to do the same about yours.

StrollerDerby Finishline: Of Breasts and Judgment and Pretty Pretty Mamas

Rachael Brownell (Redsy) — Sat, 11 Aug 2007 16:02:00 GMT

Strollerderby rocked this week. From tips on picking a preschool, to laughable pregnancy tees, to mom frump we've got you covered.

Kelly wonders if we're all a bunch of narcissists

Karen helps us understand the joys of chicken on a stick

Alisyn ponders the challenge of stay at home motherhood

Chag reminds us to leave the baby at home (when going to the 11pm movie)

The comments keep stacking up on the hospital formula ban. Join the fun!

Take Your Judgment and Shove It!

Alisyn — Fri, 10 Aug 2007 16:57:00 GMT

It's been my experience that moms, SAHMs specifically, in this case, are fed up, stressed out, and beat down. Pretty much all the time. Myself included. When your job description includes 24-hour private nurse, chauffeur, cook, psychologist, art teacher, housekeeper, shopper, list-keeper, snack-maker and butt-wiper, in addition to your paying job in many cases, it's easy to lose your sense of humor about life. What's funny is, us SAHMs? We're the lucky ones. And we know it. But that doesn't make it any easier.

It makes me feel more human and less insane to read blog posts like Freitas Family's: "I can't make dental or Dr. appts. for myself without lugging LG or waiting for MIL to have a day off or Husband to take time off. I can't go to lunch with friends without having LG with me (during the week). I have a tough time talking on the phone without LG needing something from me. I poop with someone by my side 80% of the time. I feel lonely a lot of the time. Everything in my life revolves around my kid. I don't know who I am anymore or what I love."

I feel like less of a jerk for not being 100% happy, 100% of the time, when I read that friends like CityMama are struggling with their identities and day-to-day lives, post-motherhood, like I am. Because, like she says: "We need to continue being honest with ourselves and each other so we can make motherhood better. Whatever that means to you... I say, do what you gotta do to get the word out, girl. I like commiserating just as much as celebrating when good things happen."

Having intelligent and irreverent women friends, many of whom are in the same boat I am, is what gets me through. Because motherhood is hard, dammit. And we don't need any more judgment, not even from ourselves.

So, let's talk: what's getting you down as a mother? What stresses you out? And most importantly, who do you talk to when the going gets rough?

Neverending Mommy Guilt

Kelly Mills — Wed, 01 Aug 2007 15:38:00 GMT

Maybe you though guilt was just something moms laid on their kids, but no. Many moms (hello!) feel the weight of guilt for not doing enough or being enough for their children. Working moms can be particularly afflicted, but some experts say we don't have to don the hair shirt over it. "A mother doesn't have to work 40 hours a week outside the home to feel that way, says clinical psychologist Mark Crawford. He believes some moms are born to stay at home with their children and others are not." Can I get an "Amen"?

Crawford goes on to say that guilt ain't healthy for anyone in the family, and even the kids can pick up on it and feel that they are to blame. So maybe it's time we got down off the mommy sacrificial altar and just made peace with the fact that some of us are better parents when we work outside the home (or in other cases, in the home office. But alone.) He suggests asking yourself, "'Am I doing something good for me, good for our family and ultimately good for our child even if it means I'm not there at this particular moment?'" We just have to stay involved with our little angels and get over it. I'll let you know as soon as I manage that.

Motherhood Is Not Career Suicide.

Melissa Summers — Wed, 02 May 2007 19:31:00 GMT

In answer to Leslie Bennetts claim (called 'Fear Mongering' here) that women leaving the workforce to raise children is career suicide and places women and their children in financial peril. I think she also said something about it making you fat. Or giving you acne....or something. But not so say Carol Fishman Cohen and Vivian Steir Rabin in this Op/Ed piece from the Christian Science Monitor. They say they've never felt so optimistic about the opportunities at-home mothers will find when they decide the time is right to restart a career.

The authors, who also have a book called, "Back On The Career Track: "A Guide for Stay-at-Home Moms who Want to Return to Work", claim there are more options for mothers than the two (dismal ones) Bennetts lays out. According to Bennetts women can either, juggle a full time career while raising a family or choose a lifetime of financial dependency on a spouse who might leave, die or be really annoying about taking out the trash.

The third option is what they call a career "Relaunching", women taking a break from their career and resuming it later. Employers are, according to Cohen and Rabin, more open to alternative employment arrangements (remote work, flex time, non traditional career paths) as they face the Baby Boomers starting to retire.

It's an interesting look at the issue which, unlike Bennetts book, won't require a Xanax and a brown paper bag to breath into after reading.

The Mommy War Machine: We're Being Played

Melissa Summers — Tue, 01 May 2007 19:28:00 GMT

Marissa forwarded this Washington Post Op/Ed piece from the weekend saying she thought I'd "find this interesting". And how. I've had some interesting interactions with the media in the last year which gave me several moments of pause to consider how the media plays on the inherent insecurity which seems to come with being a mother for ratings and hits on their websites.

E.J. Graff, senior researcher at Brandeis University's Schuster Institute for Investigative Journalism, argues the Mommy Wars are a fiction being churned out like a War Machine. The tension between actual stay at home mothers and working mothers has been greatly exaggerated and exploited by the media. They're invested in this myth that mothers hate each other for their choices in the work force.

This is a great read and I almost entirely agree with Graff. However I've heard my stay at home mom friends make some comments about the choices of working mothers which made me bristle a bit. I've heard women say, among friends, "If you didn't want to spend your days with your kids, why did you have them?" I've heard working mothers refer to stay at home mothers as spoiled and a little boring if not downright stupid. These comments do make me believe there is a lingering version of the Mommy Wars which is not entirely media driven. I would entirely agree the media exploits this lingering animosity between women and I also believe the working vs. stay at home debate will die, once we make the work world more friendly for all parents.

"The Feminine Mistake": Fueling The Mommy Wars?

Karen Murphy — Tue, 17 Apr 2007 16:03:00 GMT

I was so prepared to hate "The Feminine Mistake: Are We Giving Up Too Much?" by Leslie Bennetts. My initial reaction when hearing about it was, "Oh, another book bashing my choice as a stay-at-home mom, which has been my life for the past twelve years. How dare they! I'm so darn sick of these Mommy Wars!" Although I still have yet to read the book, I've read about it, including this insightful post by Amy Tiemann up at MojoMom, and I have to say that based on the past year I've had I think that Leslie Bennetts, not to mention Amy Tiemann, has a point. Or several.

I never thought for most of those twelve years that I'd one day be in the throes of a divorce which included contentious custody, support, and property division disputes, lasting almost two years now. Had I been able to foresee this possibility, or any devastating event, I might have planned ahead. Or at least known more about financial matters. (And even if you think you'll be married forever, you never know when something catastrophic might happen.)

Although I loved my time at home with my children and don't regret for a minute that choice (and I'm loving the fact as well that they're growing up and needing me less and I'm taking back my life), and I'm thankful that I can still be at home (while working), not everyone has the luxury of either of these choices. Instead of judging one another, something I have been guilty of myself, let's as parents respect each other's choices, because you can't see what's underneath and what circumstances led to another's situation.

What about you? Do you have an economic contingency plan? Do you agree that women, especially stay-at-home moms, as a group have allowed themselves to become disenfranchised as The Feminine Mistake" suggests?

Gwyneth & Calista: "How Do Other Celeb Moms Do It?"

Alisyn — Mon, 05 Feb 2007 19:51:00 GMT

Gwyneth Paltrow, mom to Apple, 2 1/2, and Moses, 10 months, is going back to work after taking 3 years off to be with her kids. Calista Flockhart, mom to 6 year old Liam, has started work on her first T.V. show after a 4 year hiatus to be a full-time mom. Both women are finding the transition from stay-at-home-mom to working mom difficult - and are speaking out about it.

Gwyneth told Entertainment Weekly about her life over the last few years, "I think I had projected, ''I'm out of the business. I live in London and I have my kids.'' And yes, that is an aspect of who I am, but I'm also a person who's very passionate about my art and film... I reached a place in my life where I thought, ''It's okay that I have a passion for something besides my family.'' I love making films. If I do one thing that makes me fulfilled, then I'm a more interesting woman for my children." She says she and husband Chris Martin will have to separate the family - while she films and he works on the new Coldplay album - and that they will just have to "try to make it work."

She returns to the big screen in the upcoming Iron Man, and is soliciting advice from other Hollywood moms/actresses who seem to have it all figured out. "I want to call Kate Winslet and say, ''Can you tell me how to do this?'' Or call Cate Blanchett and ask her to describe [her day] from 7 a.m. on."

Calista left Hollywood behind after Ally McBeal ended to focus on her then 2-year-old son, but found herself entertaining the idea of starting her new show, Brothers and Sisters, when Liam entered kindergarten this year. She told Australia's Herald Sun, "Full-time motherhood was a personal choice I made. If this script hadn't come along, I probably still wouldn't be working. But the way it turned out, my son started kindergarten, so this year I was going to start thinking about going back to work. It just happened a little sooner than I expected.

Even though she deliberately chose a show that films in her hometown of L.A., Calista says she often works 12 hour days, and is constantly juggling work and motherhood. Of embarking on this new schedule, she says, "I find it hard to juggle. I'm constantly on the phone planning play dates for Liam, and I'm racing to get home for dinner and to put him to bed. You try to find balance and sometimes you're successful and sometimes you're not. You just do the best you can."

Isn't it refreshing to read about celebrity moms who aren't raving about how "perfect" their lives and their kids are? Isn't it nice to think that a few the rich, gorgeous celebrity moms have everyday worries and problems, just like us? I love it when celebs keep it real.

UK Parents Claim They're Second Class Drones on Return to Work

thezeroboss — Thu, 01 Feb 2007 15:34:00 GMT

It's hard out there for a pimp. But apparently, it's even harder for parents who return to work after taking time off to be with their children. A survey by UK Web site mother@work reports that only 1 out of 10 parents who returned to work did so because they loved their job; most went back purely for financial reasons. Additionally, 7% of parents claim that they were passed over for promotions because of their brood, while a full 10% said that they could feel the cold, icy stares of their childless colleagues piercing them to the marrow.

I have to wonder how representative those digits are of American parents, though. Most of the moms and dads I know who returned to work after doign the stay-at-home gig did so because they felt something was missing in their lives. Most of them, in other words, love to work. My own wife is a former stay at home mom turned work at home mom, who's written eloquently about her reasons for going back to the grind.

Let's hear from the peanut gallery. (And I mean that in the most affectionate way possible.) If you used to stay home with the kids, why did you repatriate? Did you miss working? Or was it strictly a matter of the dinero?