Everyone does it better?

Ah, August! We have been busy with not much to show for it. We had visitors and house guests which actually meant a flurry of social activity for me. We also did a few family fun events which manage to eat up lots of weekends. But it all has me feeling a bit inadequate somehow.

One of the things I do and obsess about (and I assume other moms do it, too) is that I wonder why I can’t just get more done in a day or a week and wonder why it seems like everyone else is able to accomplish way more than me. Whether this is true or not, I don’t know, but it’s how I feel. I feel like if I crank up the social life, then my home is a disaster. if I plan to do things in the day with one or both kids, then I end up leaving the house looking like the bedraggled and unshowered housefrau that I am most of the time. If I choose to tend to something with the house or yard it usually means my kids don’t get a bath that night. I feel like I can never find time for all the things I want to do and these things are pretty much the basics. I’m somehow unable to have a meal on the table at the end of the day (I almost always have to wait until D. Sr. comes home and can take over at least one kid). Laundry piles up as do the bills and paperwork. So if the basics are hard to fit in, you can imagine how often the frivolous extras (blogging, my new writing project which I am not disclosing too much about yet, reading, web surfing, watching a DVD, anything to do with the house and yard, etc.) get accomplished.

Perhaps I’m too hard on myself or expecting too much, but I feel like something has to give and I’m so tired of seeing all these well-manicured, perfect moms out there looking like they have it all together! Just how do they do it when I am about 6 months overdue for a haircut, one year overdue for an eye exam and about 10 years overdue for the dentist? I mean everyone says that I’m a perfectionist and anal retentive and slightly OCD and all these things, yet how come I can’t find time to shave my legs or run a vacuum? Do I require too much down time or do I expect too much?

In the back of my mind I hear a little voice telling me to get organized and get it together, woman! Until I figure out just how to do that, though, I guess I will settle for an attempt to make some coffee before the baby wakes up and try watching some pundits spout off on Biden and Palin because it’s waaay more interesting than our upcoming election (I can’t believe our election ads highlight things like how Stephen Harper enjoys the occasional card game with his children – BORING! I need a little dose of teen preggers, prescription drug abuse and extramarital affairs with my politics.).