The Crumby Mom Group

There are certain stages in life that lead us to fit in to certain groups.  Rites of passage, so to speak.  You start dating someone and you get to change your relationship status on Facebook.  Engagement, marriage, children.  Each stage has with it a different membership card.  Hobbies too.  Everyone has their own lingo.  I'm still trying to figure out all the running words I'm supposed to know.  My most used phrase is, "I must go run or heads will roll."  I usually get shooed out of the house after that one.

The latest group or club we became a part of was the minivan club.  It's like once you get a certain type of car, you notice them everywhere.  I want to throw up a fist of van pride at stop lights.  I also find my self racing what I assume to be soccer moms on the freeway as well.  Not good on the gas mileage. 

But perhaps the group I am most comfortable with is the group that is in hiding.  They (we) are underground.  We (they) post amazing projects on Pinterest only to fail at many of them.  Here's one:

What was supposed to happen was you were supposed to shake the eggs before you boiled them.  This was supposed to scramble the eggs inside the shell and when you peeled them you would have a perfectly golden egg with perfectly blended yolk and white.  What happened was that every. single. egg. exploded.  Not one came out unscathed!  The kids knew something was wrong and wouldn't touch them.  I gagged even trying to peel the suckers. 

You see, this group that I speak of will never let you come over unannounced for fear that you are not part of the group and will thus judge them on the state of their ransacked house.  And if you plan a playdate it might have to be a week or two in advance so that they can dispose of the evidence of the days when their children have run roughshod over them and destroy the house in an hour.  The group I really belong to, really feel at home with is the Crumby Mom Group.  This is the group that, no matter how self-depreciating we may be in public just to get a laugh, on the inside we are cringing, "If you only knew how much I wasn't joking."  This is the group that no matter how many times you swept the floor today, there are still crumbs everywhere.  Even in the living room and on the couch where food is forbidden.  These are the same moms that maybe didn't even sweep the floor once today because if they have to sweep one more time the will scream.  And yeah, the kids had graham crackers on the couch even though it's forbidden cuz mommy is about to break out the forbidden "mommy drink" before daddy even gets home. 

Of course, sometimes we have a #winning moment when it comes to motherhood and we get a free pass to the perfect mother group.  But then our kid punches some other kid and we get put on probation or our card gets revoked altogether.  If you love your kids desperately and endlessly but find yourself thinking #momfail or #facepalm more often than not, you might be in this group.  If you pray feverishly that you son will be just a regular genius and not an evil genius, you might be in this goup.  If, at the end of the night, after you've put them to bed and you sit down just for one show and you find that you've forgotten about the wet laundry in the wahser and all the dishes that need done and the only energy you have left is to drag yourself to bed, congratulations!  You are not alone.  You belong to a secret society.  Our official badges are snot and/or some other bodily fluid that usually shows up on our shoulders.  We can also be recognized by a smear of some sort of food (we hope) on a pant leg or two. 

We are not an exclusive group.  We do have guest passes for the perfect parent that is having a rough day.  You can stay until your child moves out, even.  You can even come over for coffee sometime.  Just call a week in advance and I apologize in advance if my child punches yours.