So, allow me to reintroduce myself:
My name is Jean. I married Carlo nearly five years ago, though we've been together for over 22 years. I'm the mother of nearly 4 year old identical twin boys, A & J.
I'm a legal secretary / executive assistance / accounts receiveable manager.
My time is cramped, by my own doing. It shouldn't be hard to manage my time with what I have to do, but somehow, I just don't seem to have enough time in the day to make everyone happy.
(nice and blurry, just like me in the morning)
My average work day is thus: I wake between 6:30 and 7 a.
On the road by a little after 7 a.m;
(passing a farm field just around the corner from my home. This field is home to a flock of about 9 to 12 deer. I've also seen numerous field cats, oppossums, bunnies, and just two weeks ago I saw a fox. This field lies in a small depression and has set the scene for many gorgeous foggy scenes (complete with the deer) and frosty mornings. )
Here I lament the ever increasing price of gas.
I run through the drive through for breakfast about once a week.
Drive past the airport (if you notice, the time on the board is "7:20"so I left my house at 7:05. 15 minutes and I'm not even on the highway yet.
Entering the rat race.
Pass some pretty cool landmarks (St. Michaels on Scranton)
See some pretty cool landscapes.
Arrive at my office building.
(Isn't this brass post office box just great?)
8 o'clock. Already.
(1/2 an hour before I have to clock in, but I use that time to catch up on headline reading and eating breakfast).
My chaos.
Work from 8:30 to 5:30 (with a 1 hour lunch at my desk)
Finally time to go home.
Leave work and drive home. Pass my some interesting sites. (a man killed his wife with an axe in the back of this house during the late 1800s, just because she nagged him.)
At least the traffic isn't as bad going home.
The airport.
I get home at about 6:10. Carlo usually has dinner ready when I arrive. We eat, finishing at about 7 (or 8, if we opt to play outside before dinner). Then we play, watch t.v., go to the playground, or have bath night. Then it's nightime routine with the boys (they love watching Kipper and Pajanamals in our bed), then they go to bed about 9 p.m. (that is if we're lucky, lately it's been closer to 10:00 or even 10:30) By then I'm exhausted, and still have to clean up after dinner, take a shower, or finally get to catch up on all the shows I've dvr'd. Then I'm in bed at about 10:30 - just to start all over again the next morning. Lately, we've added working out to our routine. I love Wii Fit and EA Active. But the only time we have to work out is after the boys go to bed. So we start about 10:30, so I'm not in bed until about 11:30.
I've also just joined a gym. God help me. I'll try to make it there at least twice a week on Saturday and Sunday morning, and try, maybe a Wednesday evening on the way home from work.
On weekends, it's a bit more hectic. Carlo works Friday, Saturday and Sunday nights from 7 p.m. until 7:30 a.m. the next morning. Which means when I get home from work in Friday (a little earlier than the rest of the week), he's getting ready to go to work. I do dinner for me and the kids (sometimes I opt for a night out to Target or Walmart with a fast food dinner), occupy the boys for the rest of the night and then struggle to get them to bed before 9:30. Saturday and Sundays, I watch the boys all morning, trying to keep them semi-quiet while their Daddy sleeps upstairs until about 1 or 2 p.m. Then he joins us for a few hours before he has to start getting ready for work again. Sometimes that's when we go out as a family to the store, or play in the backyard, whatever. I need to get dinner ready on those days as well. It's just difficult keeping my eye on the boys and cook/grill, and whatever else. On Monday mornings, I also get to work later because I need to get the boys ready for school / summer camp so that as soon as Carlo gets home from work at 8:30, he can get them to wherever they need to be.
On top of all that, I'm constantly creating projects for myself. Like this blog and genealogy, creating scrapbooks, needlepoint, gardening, reading, and writing. Not to mention my addiction to computer games.
So, when do I have time to create a menu, shop, prep, cook and clean up?
The answer is I don't. If you noticed in my run-down of the week, I don't have time in there for laundry, cleaning, shopping, etc. I am incredibly fortunate to have a husband who does the majority of it. Yes, my husband actually does laundry. He even knows how to use the built-in fabric softener dispenser. He folds, too. He mops the floor, cleans up the dog poo, cleans the cat's litter box - and he also -- prepare yourself -- cleans the toilets. He grocery shops, too. He uses coupons. How the hell did I get so lucky? How did he end up with someone like me? Actually, I don't mind grocery shopping. I take the boys shopping sometimes on Friday nights or Saturday mornings to buy our fresh items. Carlo is real big on buying convenience foods (because, well, that's what he had a coupon for -- when was the last time you saw a coupon for watermelon or a bunch of carrots, or a pound of halibut filets -- which were on sale last week!)
So all that said, explained, and out of the way -- here we go. The official relaunch of Who Has Time to Cook.
So many of those cookbooks out there claim to be for those people who are too busy to cook. Well, I'm going to put them to a working mom's test.
My first test? Gordon Ramsay and his cookbook Fast Food.
Does Ramsay tell the truth when he says anyone has time to cook, or is that just more foul-mouthed bullshit coming from him?
Stay tuned.