Traditional Roles of Men and Women

[Spaz]

Originally Posted by RC Vikings

We go under the system where the money she earns is her money and the money I earn is our money. She buys her own stuff and stuff for the boys so it helps.

Nice. My wife & I work on the principle that her money and my money is our money.

If my wife tried to go to this sort of principle, I think I'd end up divorced.

[Levin]

Originally Posted by Archaea

How many mothers SAHM types just stay home.

My family enjoys a SAHM, and my kids were never home. You have delusions if you believe a SAHM is home much of the time.

You're ignoring the point: SaHMs are still home more of the time; more importantly, so are the kids. More time at home for the kids = more messes. At work all day;at day care all day = zero messes.

Plus, a lot of SAHMs do stay home a lot of the time. You were blessed, apparently, with a wife who had the energy, desire, and sociability to get out of the house a lot. I am too, but I know lots of SaHMs who spend most of their days inside the home. If you think otherwise, you're the delusional one; but why start with the attacks on our mental capacities? But seriously, just think about it . . .

[TripletDaddy]

Another benefit of a large migrant population.

We pay a group of ladies to come to our house once a week and do a nice thorough clean....they come on fridays for about 3 hours. There are 3 of them.

For $25 a week, we get:

1. Full vacuum of all rooms and steps
2. Bathroom countertops, tubs, mirrors, toilets (including folding the corners of the exposed piece of toilet paper)
3. Kitchen--clean countertops, polish appliances
4. Downstairs--clean wood floor with some sort of mop and wood cleaner thing
5. Throughout--Dust windowsills and take out trash

I just factor that into our cost of living, as though it were part of my mortgage payment.

It could quite possibly be the best money we spend. Not only does my wife get some help during the day, it makes our house look deep cleaned for several days, and my wife can take off with the kids for 3 hours every Friday morning to do something fun....she gets to recharge her batteries.

You can pay more for them to come more often, but once a week is about all we need. The rest of the time, she doesnt feel overwhelmed. Plus, I dont mind doing stuff when I get home. I almost always vacuum at least once a week, but mostly because I like to do it.

[marsupial]

Originally Posted by Levin

It's more messy to watch kids in the home all day than to drop them off at day care in the morning and then pick them up at night. Who is there to mess up the house while the working mother and kids are gone? Your statement seems ignorant and silly, but maybe all the working mothers you know have rats living in their homes who drink beer and eat the couch all day while the fam is gone.

Amen to that. When everyone is home on the weekend, the house is a disaster. There is no way to keep up with everyone. Kids make messes. I'll go to bed with a clean house, get up early, head to the gym and by the time I get back (when everyone is already awake) it's like I never cleaned at all. I don't complain much about having to do it. And I appreciate danimal's high tolerance for mess and willingness to chip in.

[Jeff Lebowski]

Originally Posted by TripletDaddy

Another benefit of a large migrant population.

We pay a group of ladies to come to our house once a week and do a nice thorough clean....they come on fridays for about 3 hours. There are 3 of them.

For $25 a week, we get:

1. Full vacuum of all rooms and steps
2. Bathroom countertops, tubs, mirrors, toilets (including folding the corners of the exposed piece of toilet paper)
3. Kitchen--clean countertops, polish appliances
4. Downstairs--clean wood floor with some sort of mop and wood cleaner thing
5. Throughout--Dust windowsills and take out trash

I just factor that into our cost of living, as though it were part of my mortgage payment.

It could quite possibly be the best money we spend. Not only does my wife get some help during the day, it makes our house look deep cleaned for several days, and my wife can take off with the kids for 3 hours every Friday morning to do something fun....she gets to recharge her batteries.

You can pay more for them to come more often, but once a week is about all we need. The rest of the time, she doesnt feel overwhelmed. Plus, I dont mind doing stuff when I get home. I almost always vacuum at least once a week, but mostly because I like to do it.

Wait a minute, three workers for three hours for $25 total? 25/(3*3) = $2.78/hr. Those are slave wages. You feel good about that?

[Archaea]

Originally Posted by Levin

You're ignoring the point: SaHMs are still home more of the time; more importantly, so are the kids. More time at home for the kids = more messes. At work all day;at day care all day = zero messes.

Plus, a lot of SAHMs do stay home a lot of the time. You were blessed, apparently, with a wife who had the energy, desire, and sociability to get out of the house a lot. I am too, but I know lots of SaHMs who spend most of their days inside the home. If you think otherwise, you're the delusional one; but why start with the attacks on our mental capacities? But seriously, just think about it . . .

If any woman stays at home most of the time, then she needs her 'ludes. How can any person just stay home, it drove my wife nuts, so she didn't. Messes are messes.

There are solutions to it, but I've seen those homes and frankly I wouldn't want to live there.

[TripletDaddy]

Originally Posted by Jeff Lebowski

Wait a minute, three workers for three hours for $25 total? 25/(3*3) = $2.78/hr. Those are slave wages. You feel good about that?

Sorry, I was not clear.

Each person comes for about an hour and does her thing--3 total manhours. So it actually works out to about $8-9 per hour. Often, they are there for less than the 3 hours, esp if they all show up at the same time.

If you think about it, if your task was to empty the trashes and dust the windowsills, that isnt going to take you an hour. We live in a small 3 bedroom townhouse. The woman who does the mop on the wood floor takes the longest. the other 2 tend to breeze through pretty efficiently.

[RockyBalboa]

I grew up in a home where my Mom ran a daycare. My entire life growing up when I left for school there were kids at the house and when I came home...there were kids at the house all the time up to, and sometimes past dinner time.

I feel I had a unique insight on the daily grind of parents who drop their kids off and the kids who are left to be without their mom or dad all day long. Personally I think it effects the relationship of the kid with the parents to a detriment...and that's just based on my upclose and personal observations growing up. My mom was fantastic with these kids and in her age and her condition many of these kids have grown up still calling her "Grandma" and love her to death. In short I think the parents miss out on way too much and I can imagine later on in life wish they had a lot of that back.

Having said that, were I to get married again, I'm not a staunch advocate of one specific way. Do I have a preference? Yeah I do, I prefer her to stay home and raise the child that way, but if the girl I marry loves her career or wants to get into a career then I would do everything I could to support her in that so long as the children aren't neglected.

I'm just not a big fan of the dropping kids off everyday, all day long at a daycare.

To me the Role of Being a Mom is greater than the prestige one thinks a career can bring them. And no I'm not saying they can't do both, but if one were to choose, for me I know what my preference is.

[Indy Coug]

My wife spent several years in daycare as a child. Because of this, she was determined not to have our kids go through the same thing.

[RC Vikings]

Originally Posted by TripletDaddy

Another benefit of a large migrant population.

We pay a group of ladies to come to our house once a week and do a nice thorough clean....they come on fridays for about 3 hours. There are 3 of them.

For $25 a week, we get:

1. Full vacuum of all rooms and steps
2. Bathroom countertops, tubs, mirrors, toilets (including folding the corners of the exposed piece of toilet paper)
3. Kitchen--clean countertops, polish appliances
4. Downstairs--clean wood floor with some sort of mop and wood cleaner thing
5. Throughout--Dust windowsills and take out trash

I just factor that into our cost of living, as though it were part of my mortgage payment.

It could quite possibly be the best money we spend. Not only does my wife get some help during the day, it makes our house look deep cleaned for several days, and my wife can take off with the kids for 3 hours every Friday morning to do something fun....she gets to recharge her batteries.

You can pay more for them to come more often, but once a week is about all we need. The rest of the time, she doesnt feel overwhelmed. Plus, I dont mind doing stuff when I get home. I almost always vacuum at least once a week, but mostly because I like to do it.

This is going to come back to bite you when you run for president.