Pioneer spirit still alive in my sistas

I like discovering what women do with their "spare" time. It's nice knowing I have sistas in the same boat as me. I use sistas to mean women, not my literal sisters. Amazingly to me, many women I know also work from home part-time. In my neighborhood,

• Rina down the street tries putting in four hours a day balancing books for a grocery store in Hawaii.
• Her sister-in-law Jonelle runs a screen printing business out of her home.
• Ellen sells insurance from her home.
• Allyssa around the corner is an editor at a newspaper and does the majority of work from home.
• Mandy sells cosmetics.
• Kama runs the books and helps out where she can for her husband's painting and construction business.
• Lacy makes crafts and sells them at Quilted Bear.
• Maria helps manage the family's rental properties.

I once had an idea to start a woman's cooperative business, where instead of businesses paying people overseas low wages to do work, they pay some stay-at-home moms low wages to do work. Sometimes women just like a little spending money of their own. And it's not so these women can go buy themselves Manolo shoes. Most women use their money to help ease the family finances. Finally, the family car's oil can be changed when the sticker says it should, the girls can get much needed haircuts, or new clothes for the kids won't break the family bank.

I try squeezing my work in before the kids get up and sprinkle it throughout the day. The problem I've been running up against lately is that Nohea has been getting up with me, crying. So I snuggle her to bed, falling to sleep in the process. I awake at 7:40 AM. My plans are all but ruined. Trying to sneak in five hours of work while they're awake is painful.

"Mom, can you get me a glass of milk?" "Mom, can we go to the park?" "Mom, can you help me do this puzzle, read this book, help me spell?"

Then there's the constant laundry and dishes. It all seems a little much, but it's nothing new for women.

I think of our pioneer ancestors often. What did they do with the children when it was time to do laundry, help on the farm, or cook dinner? I'm sure the children, even very small children, just ran around the neighborhood, because the neighborhood consisted of cousins and little wild animals, and they didn't have the fear of a car running them over or someone kidnapping the kids (but there were rattlesnacks, which still scurry around our neighborhood from time to time).

Even so, if we just budgeted better and didn't eat out as much, I could probably get rid of my part-time job. When the baby wakes early in the morning, I ask myself, "Is this satan tempting me to quit my job and place my family on faulty financial footing, or is this God's way of telling me to quit my job and put my priorities in order?" And then we have the near financial meltdown that occurred last week in this country, and I think, "Maybe it's time I go to full-time and just pay off all our debts in fast order." If only the government would bail us out.