Household Administration Duties & Ants, Ants, Ants

This image is taken from this amazing article on SheKnows.com. 

I am the all-powerful Oz of our household. I am the administrator, family wellness and health coordinator and master of service providers.

Before baby, when I was working full-time and not breastfeeding, my husband and I split everything as 50/50 as possible. Nonetheless, we still fell into some pretty traditional habits. Hubby and I have very different standards when it comes to household cleanliness, so I've always taken on more of the domestic stuff. He is the breadwinner, always drives, always pays, opens doors and does other gentlemanly things. We used to eat out or order in most of the time, so I didn't cook a lot. He grilled about as often as I cooked. When something happened, like a leaky faucet or bug problem, we'd call the landlord. If it took a couple of days, we were both at work all the time and so it didn't matter much anyway.

But now that we have a baby, and she and I are home all the time, there are so many things that must be done to keep our house in order. For example, in our current townhouse, there is a smoke/CO2 detector in the kitchen. It kept going off every time we turned on the oven. So we took the batteries out, naturally. If it were still just us, we'd probably leave it that way for the rest of our lease. But thanks to baby cakes, instead I called the gas company to get a technician out here to test the toxicity of the air in the kitchen and house. He found no gas leaks and all chemical levels were well below normal. He said that our smoke detector kept going off because it's too close to the oven, and, in fact, it's placement is unusual. We let the landlords know, and they were no help. They suggested we open the window when we cook... We got a new smoke detector and it's not located as close to the oven. And I cook with the window open for good measure.

About 2 months ago, I woke up earlier than the baby. Hallejua! I planned to make myself a cup of coffee and read a magazine. I walked into the kitchen to find what looked like the stove top moving... Ack. The stove top was covered in ants. Like a blanket of moving ants.

I opened up the kitchen windows, the door leading from the kitchen to the garage and the garage door and sprayed the hell out of the stove top and surrounding cabinets. I then got to work disposing of the bodies - what seemed like millions of ant corpses. I had just enough time to change my clothes and wash up afterward before baby girl woke up. So much for a little me time.

Around the same time as the kitchen ant-scapade, I started this post. I was in the midst of a mail merge so I could print address labels for our Christmas cards and I giggled to myself, noting how strange it is to use my Microsoft Office skills at home. Before going to the post office to drop off our family Christmas cards, I took a quick look around and decided the weekly cleaning service we're paying for is too expensive for what we're getting. So I called and requested a service cancelation. At the same time, our part-time nanny texts me to let me know she's sick and can't make it in at all that day... How is it I found myself dealing with staffing issues at home?

A word on mommyhood: grind.

But without the luxury of 9-5.