I’m ‘That Mom’
It’s Oct. 1 and already I have elaborate plans for homemade costumes for all three kids. I know what candy I’ll give out for Halloween, and I’m planning the annual goodie bags the boys and I make for their friends every year.
The church where my daughter attends preschool is having its annual Oktoberfest celebration this weekend an I’m making cupcakes for the bake sale (funds support the preschool). Today, I bought a dozen individual cupcake boxes and mentally designed the tags I plan to attach to each.
I’ve finally settled on a date for my daughter’s birthday party so now I can take the pictures and create her custom birthday party invitations. We’re scaling down a bit this year, but there are still gift bags to make for her guests. And since there are so few, I’m thinking of making them little purses and embroidering their names on them.
Yes, I am “that mom.”
I did not realize this until someone else — a total stranger — pointed it out to me. I was picking up my oldest from a Sweet Sixteen party last year and the guest of honor’s mother brought up the wrapped candy bars I’d made for the previous Halloween. “You just do everything, don’t you?” she commented. And I immediately felt like the most over-the-top, overachieving wannabe on the planet.
I’m crafty; I like making things. But I sometimes worry that my addiction to paper, fabric and glitter makes it seem like some kind of competition for craftiest mom. Or is that Craftiest Mom? It’s so not the point, yet I don’t know how to make it clear that it’s just fun for me. I get the same kind of endorphin release from crafting that I used to from running, back before my knee mutinied.
I think I need a T-shirt: “Don’t Hate Me Because I’m Crafty.” I’ll make it, of course.
