Most weekdays I feel like I'm not the best mom. You would think that after a day to myself of working and TCOB I would happily pause my portion of the day and greet my family with joy. But at least right now that can be hard, for whatever reason. Maybe the transition from Me/Work Time to Them Time is too hard for me or maybe, as I've always posited, the end of the day can just be hard on everyone so it's just inherently stressful. But I do feel guilty that I don't see the kids all day--and in fact have time to attend to my own needs and ambitions--and then sometimes am like "When is bedtime?" a few minutes after they walk in the door.

When I'm feeling mopey, this sometimes makes me wonder what I'm even doing in the first place. But then the weekends come and without the obligation to get a lot done in a short amount of time we can do things slower and lazier which is much more enjoyable. I have time to color with Paul or throw a ball around with James. I also think my kids are just at an age where getting things done takes a lot of time and it's less annoying when you aren't spending a big part of the day transitioning them to school, out of school, out of the kitchen, into bed. And on top of that it helps that I put a hard stop to work on the weekends when I can--I'm definitely more irritable, with the boys or with Steve, when I'm coming out of a workday and stressing a little bit about the day to come.  

I'm going to try to just accept this and see if it does away with any guilt I feel about how I'm supposed to be. My mom was crabby sometimes when I was a kid and I don't look back at it and think "What a bad mom she was." And I bet it'll get easier with time. Or not. I'll just then have some extra free time to find something else to feel bad about.