15+ Easy Ways To Be A Fun Mom Even When You’re Stressed
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I always imagined I would be a fun mom. I would stay home with my kids, we’d play all day, the house would stay clean and we’d just spend all day laughing, smiling, and playing. Then I had my daughter. I quickly realized that my original ‘plan’ was unrealistic. Being a fun mom is harder than I originally thought.
Real life is full of dirty dishes, random articles of clothing scattered around the house and bath water spilling over the side. I have to plan, prep, shop for, and cook 3 meals a day plus snacks. I have to pay bills, run errands, and shower. I had showering because sometimes it’s harder than it should be just to take a shower. Plus more.. more cleaning, more cooking, more more more. It might now sound like it but all of that is stressful and exhausting. Some times I spend a whole day being an adult and forget to have fun with my daughter. We do stuff, and she plays but I am typically distracted and to me that doesn’t count. I want to enjoy time with my daughter and play with her. Really play.
Sometimes it is hard to focus on playing when I know I have a whole to-do list to do. But I remember hearing that kids just need 10 minutes. When my daughter is begging for my attention, if I give her 10 focused minutes, she will be content and I can go back to my list. Then an hour or so later, I play with her for another 10 minutes. That sounds horrible, but it’s not. It’s hard to balance everything and this is exactly how I get it all done.
So I sat down and made a list of things that my daughter, or both of us, would consider fun and I vowed to do one thing every day. Clearly there are days that this doesn’t happen. Remember we’re talking real life here. Sometimes our day is just too busy. But every day that I can we do something fun from this list.
- Tell knock knock jokes
- Have ice cream for lunch
- Go to the park and actually play too
- Play freeze tag
- Talk with an accent for an hour
- Lay on the floor and color
- Have a race
- Play school and let your child be the teacher
- Have a pillow fight
- Build a fort in the living room
- Play fun music and dance
- Put blue (or whatever color) food coloring in everything or dinner
- Have a Lego building competition
- Let your child pick the story line & play
- Have a water fight
- Give your little one a makeover with your make up
It’s so important to spend time with our children and on their level. Being the fun mom doesn’t have to take hours and hours and it doesn’t mean we can’t be productive in the adult world. On less crazy days, spend more time having fun with your little one. On crazy days, take 10 minutes here and there having fun.