Chores

I'm wondering how other families deal with the seemingly unending laundry, meal cooking, and dish washing that make up my life. Seriously, I only have one child and I spend the vast majority of my free time in one of these three pursuits. As you can see, from the photo, sometimes I am forced to bring in child labor.

The other day I was talking with a neighbor whose four children are my age and I asked her "How on earth did you keep up with the laundry?" She just laughed mentioned something about not having a dryer at the time and headed home. You could tell she didn't want to talk about that dark period in her history, I figure she has post traumatic stress disorder, and made a mental note to keep clothes pin out of sight.

In the most recent issue of Oprah magazine they had an article that sited research from the University of Michigan stating having a husband adds 7 hours of house work per week for women. I can't say as I noticed that, but I wouldn't be surprised if having a child did. The research also says that women spend 9 hours less doing house work in 2006 than in 1976. So, I suppose I should be grateful, for the dishwasher, the microwave, and the glorious dryer. If I had to hang laundry I'd snap!

earthquake

earthquake
Originally uploaded by hypostylin

O.K. It wasn't this bad, we certainly didn't see Victoria Principal running around in a giant afro. Still it was exciting and a little scary.

Call me Mabel

You know the dreaded threat of turning into your mother? I think I leap frogged it and am turning into my Grandmothers. I'm fighting it but I can see that it's happening.
My grandmothers are great but one of them is almost 100 and the other past away last year just shy of 101. So as you would expect, they're a bit behind the times.
These are women who have never used a microwave, a computer, or a answering machine, let alone a cell phone. Now of course, I have used these modern marvels, but I'm falling behind. For instance, how do you download music or, upload pictures from your camera to your computer. I won't even get into the dreaded text messaging!!! How you may ask have I made it this far into the 21st century without adapting these skills? I'll tell you, it's the technically advanced husband, and my own laziness.
I remember being at a gas station once, and there was this elderly lady trying to figure out how to swipe her credit card and pump gas, When I asked if I could help, she told me how she had never pumped gas. It had been her husband that had done it all her adult life, and now that he was gone she had to learn to do all these things. Am I teetering at the edge of this precipice?
I'm starting with baby steps in my battle to stay technologically current, in fact it's probably more akin to crawling.. I learned to work the bar-b-que. I'll need sustenance if I'm going to conquer the Ipod, texting, and whatever they come up with next.
In the mean time you can just call me Mabel.

Welcome

Welcome, to you and me both.
This is my first blog. I'm Elise, I'm a massage therapist, a mom, a wife, a sister, a daughter, and many other things, to which we can now add blogger. I grew up in Santa Monica (South side, for those who must know) in the 70's and 80's. I've been a massage therapist for about 10 years. I've been married for 7 years and have a 4 year old daughter.
I hope you'll be interested in what I write, I know I'll be interested to hear what you have to say. The old "But enough about me. What do you think about me."
Wish me luck,
Elise