A clean home?

It's funny, maybe not funny, more disgusting really, how all the sudden, the second you switch over from being a single woman to a married woman, there becomes all these unspoken expectations. When you're still single, but engaged to be married, you are just beyond excited to finally get married and live with the man you love more than anyone, and wake up next to him each morning. Little do us naive women know, with that privledge of residing with the one we love come unspoken expectations! Funny thing is, usually (at least in my case), it's not expectations that our husbands put on us, we put them on ourselves and on each other as women!!! WHAT?!?! Why do we do that? Sure there are lots of them, having a meal cooked each evening, keeping up with the laundry, and most of all, keeping the house clean. All the sudden, the moment you say "I DO", these expecations become blarringly obvious to women. Josh has never once questioned where his dinner was, or why the house was so messy, or why I hadn't washed his clothes soon enough. Again, I'm married to the perfect man. :) As women we don't need husbands nagging at us to feel these pressures, we do that all by ourselves!

Why is it, that anytime I go to another woman's home, it's always spotless and a candle burning and fresh baked bread in the oven and everything in it's place? Or it sure seems that way from the outside.

Now don't get me wrong, this is our HOME we are talking about. And it's very important to keep it clean and picked up and appealing for guests to come inside and feel welcome and want to stay. As I talked about in a past Blog about making church our HOME and treating church as you would your own HOME when you have guests over....I still think there is an importance to keeping a clean HOME, and that is not just to show off to the other women who stop by. But to create an environment appealing to anyone who comes over to come in, stay awhile and be a part of your life in your HOME.

But what about those times when life happens and other things take priority? Will guests understand? Will I be judged? Is a spotless HOME always an expecation?

Ty is 9 weeks old today and for some reason, taking care of the house work has really taken some extra attention in order to find time to get done since his birth. And today it just so happens that my little man got his shots! :( It was such a sad day for us both. But now he's sleeping on me and I'm going to let him cuddle as much as he needs to today. I'm not going to force him to sleep in his own bed just so I can get some housework done. I want him to know that mommy's here and I will keep him safe and protect him and will not leave him alone. So all of our friends coming over tonight for supper and small group hopefully will not mind if the bathroom isn't spotless, and the carpet hasn't been swept and living room dusted. Because today, Ty needs his mommy (and mommy needs her Ty :) ) and for this once, just this once, I'm going to try to not stress out about the expectations I as a woman put on myself to keep a clean home. Might drive me crazy....and I'll be honest, I hope he allows me 15 min to clean a little at least, but I know I'm not less of a woman by putting Ty 1st today. Right?

Thankfully I've got some pretty stellar friends who I know will love me no matter what my house looks like. Again, it's these darn expectations we put on ourselves!

So for any woman out there feeling the stress of a dirty home, uncooked meal, and dirty clothes, my advice for you to do today:

As soon as you and your husband are home from work, leave your dirty house (and don't think about it when you're gone- out of site out of mind:) ), go out to eat, and go buy some new clothes since all of your others are dirty! Sure this might be an expensive option, so maybe don't do this too often, but definitely DO do it! And don't feel guilty for it. As as woman you deserve it and the expectations will be there waiting for you another day. :)