I’m a mom, I work full-time, and I act with a local community theatre. This means I hear a lot of “How do you do it?” and “Don’t you miss spending time with your kid?”  Some people genuinely want to know because they are trying to do the same thing, and others use these questions as a way to mask their accusations that I’m a terrible mother. This post is for those who genuinely want to know. To everyone else-f$%# off.

First of all, yeah, it’s rough. I’m not going to lie, things get a little out of control sometimes, the house is a disaster, but I can’t give up any of these things. They each contribute to my personal and emotional (and financial) well-being. What works for me isn’t going to work for everyone, but here’s how I make it happen:

1. A supportive spouse. He enjoys watching me perform, helping me study lines and likes having some daddy-son bonding time. We equally share household responsibilities, and I would be just as supportive if he decided to join a bowling league or something. If you’re single, hopefully you have a best friend or family member who can fill this role, because a support system is crucial.
2. Know your limits. I perform in one full-length play a year, which is roughly two months of rehearsals 3 nights a week. The rest of the year, I might do a couple last minute staged readings, go see some live theatre, or do a one act with minimal rehearsal commitment. I like theatre, so I keep it in my life, but it’s really only a huge time suck for a couple months of the year and that’s what makes me happy.
3. Blue Apron and Kroger Clicklist. I do not have time to meal plan or grocery shop, also I hate both. Blue Apron plans three healthy and delicious meals for me each week and ships the ingredients to my house. It’s worth it. Kroger now has my favorite thing ever, Clicklist. You order all your groceries online (in my pajamas on my ipad), swing by the store on your way from work, and they load everything you ordered into your car.
4. Wake up early to make time for things that you love. I like having breakfast each morning with my kid at the kitchen table, so I make time for it. It’s very easy for me to choose this over an extra 15 minutes of sleep, for some of you it might not be. Especially for those of you who have kids who aren’t sleeping through the night yet.
5. Go to bed early. This clearly goes hand-in-hand with #4. Nothing good happens after 9:00pm, right? Don’t tell me if it does.

Those are my top five tips, hopefully they will help you in some way. I might also suggest “hitting the highlights” rather than deep cleaning and giving up on ever committing to watching a tv show on a regular basis.

So a couple months late, but we went to Traverse City, Michigan in late August for our first real family summer vacation and I’m still not finished talking about it. I have ALWAYS wanted to go “up north,” mainly because of their frickin’ brilliant advertisements. Their radio commercials are my zen. I wish I had them all looped together on a CD so I could listen to them as I sat in the bath with a glass of wine and candles.

Anyway, after much research and a careful consideration of each Pure Michigan commercial, I decided that Traverse City would be the perfect fit for the following reasons:

•  Affordable
• Within driving distance (8 hours, we don’t mind a bit of a road trip and neither does our kid)
• Family-friendly
• Lots of different kinds of activities
• Beautiful scenery
• Delicious food
• Alcohol (because Mama and Daddy might need a little something to make it through a full week of non-stop family time)

We decided to stay at Cherry Tree Inn and Suites because they had great reviews, their own beach, a pool and amazing rooms. We upgraded and went with the Leelanau Suite with a wraparound porch and Jacuzzi so that we’d have something fun to do after L’s early bed time. So worth it. This hotel did not disappoint, the room was gorgeous, comfortable, the view was amazing, beach was clean, pool was perfect, friendly staff, tasty breakfast. They even have a pirate ship on their beach for kids to play on! The only downside was that it’s on a busy road. It wasn’t noticeable inside, but when we sat outside at night, we could hear the traffic. We didn’t care (and this seems to be the case with most of the hotels in the area), but if you’re looking for more isolation, look for a rental cabin. Also-right across the street was a Walgreens-this was so PERFECT because we forgot/ran out of so many things.

Another important note is that there is a gorgeous Meijer just outside of town (you’ll probably see it on your drive in, it looks brand new), they carried a surprising amount of local products. Our room had a mini-fridge, so we bought picnic supplies and snacks there and picnicked somewhere new every day.

We are not vacation planners, we like to get there and just figure it out day by day. Traverse City is great for this, especially when we went, which was right in between the summer and fall vacation rush. We didn’t have to wait for anything. We ate breakfast at the hotel, picnicked for lunch, then went out to dinner each night. Here’s what we ended up doing:

Sleeping Bear Dunes. OMG, yes. Everyone will tell you that you have to do this and they are right. It is so cool, especially if you have kids who like sand. Don’t worry about getting to the top, we only made it to the top of the first hump. Climb as far as you can, go back down, get in your car and take the Scenic Drive, this is absolutely mandatory. Scenic Outlooks 9 and 10 are the absolute most beautiful places I have ever seen. The kind of beauty that makes you gasp and cry, I totally did both of these. TWICE. I had to see it one more time before we left. If you can only do one thing in Traverse City-do this scenic drive.

Children’s Museum. This is a pretty tiny place, but they have a lot of activities packed inside. Our kid is two and loved it, but I don’t know that anyone over 5 would think it was that impressive. We saved this for a rainy day…and apparently so did everyone else in the state. We got there when it opened and for about an hour it wasn’t too bad, then everyone came in and it was absolute madness. So go early or on a really nice day when everyone is at the beach. Young children will have so much fun!

Mission Point Lighthouse. The drive there is beautiful, take your time and stop at some fruit stands to buy some fresh produce-it was amazing. There are also tons of wineries. We didn’t stop at any because we had the kid, but if it had been the two of us, that would have been the main goal. The lighthouse was fun to see, there’s a nice little beach, but don’t waste your time paying to climb to the top. Especially if you have a young child. The steps are ladder steep, only three people can go at a time, there are no staff members managing the line and it is a crazy tourist free-for-all. I can’t even imagine the chaos during peak season. Enjoy it from the outside, look for petoskey stones on the beach, then move on.

Moomers. Go to the original one, you get to look at the cows that made the ice-cream as you eat it. They do tours and stuff too, but we were happy to just eat ice-cream and watch the cows. We went twice…I loved the chocolate salted caramel, and I don’t even like chocolate ice-cream. OH-they also have a flight of ice-cream, this was just fantastic. We tried 5 ice-creams all at once. Best day ever.

Jolly Pumpkin. This brewery was delightful. Another gorgeous drive to get there, tons of parking, great beer and food. The service was excellent.

Apache Trout Grill. This is a lovely restaurant with an amazing view and a nice tiki bar if you just want to grab a drink on the beach. The wall facing the water completely opens up. That being said, the parking is awful, food is only okay, especially considering what it costs, the service is passable, and it seems geared towards the retiree crowd. We didn’t hate it, but wouldn’t go back either.

Grand Traverse Pie Company. We love pie, so we saw this place and had to stop in. YUM! The pies were great, so was the coffee. They warm it up for you if you want and you get to choose ice-cream or whipped cream for topping.

North Peak Brewing Company. This was the first place we ate in TC, we found it while driving around. The beer was so great, food was awesome, so extremely kid friendly, service was good. We stopped at Meijer on the way home and took some of their beer back to our family and friends.

Taproot Cider House. This is not really kid-friendly, they have a kids menu, but no high chairs or boosters(?). We decided to try it anyway because there wasn’t a crowd at all. They have tons of ciders, of course, the ones we tried were delicious. Their food is all local/organic/vegan/glutenfree, all that sort of patchouli crap, but it tasted great! A little snobby, but the food and drink were worth it.

Those were all the things worth mentioning. There were so many other things we wanted to do and places to visit, so we’ll definitely go back. You really can’t go wrong, it’s a beautiful city with plenty of outdoor fun and yummy places to eat. It also didn’t seem very touristy. We only saw one other car with a non-Michigan license plate…Ohio. Honestly, it feels like you are visiting your friend in their hometown. What are you waiting for? GO already!

Scenic Outlook #9!

Pretty much since L learned to walk, we’ve asked him to help us with chores. He loves it. Now that he’s two, he is actually quite helpful. Asking a two-year-old to help with chores requires a lot of patience but it’s been worth it. He’s gained some independence and feels like a contributor, we don’t have to follow around behind him cleaning up messes constantly. These are the things we ask him to do:

-Help unload the dishwasher. He stacks up plastic plates, put utensils in drawers and cabinets he can reach, hand us plates, bowls to put away. He have colorful dishes, so we also use this to work on the names of colors, or counting skills.

-Help set the table. Give each person a napkin, fork, plate.

-Help clear the table after dinner. Brings plates and cups to whoever is washing the dishes.

-Unpack groceries. We have him help get things out of the bags, bring items to us to put on higher shelves. He even carries in the lighter bags from the car!

-Put away his toys and books. Toys go into an open bin, books go on a low shelf.

-Put away shoes. We are all bad about taking off our shoes all over the house, but he will happily put them all back in the cubbies by the door.

-Throw away trash. Just small non-messy things like an envelope, napkin, empty container.

-Feed the dog. Our dog’s food is in a big tin with a plastic scoop. He pulls it out of the pantry a few feet to be close to the dog’s bowl, takes off the lid, gives him a big scoop of food, and pushes the tin back into the pantry.

-Carry in the mail. I get it out of the box and hand it to him.

-Water the flowers. I just put a small amount of water in a regular watering can, but I’ve seen child-sized ones too.

-Pick tomatoes, beans, and strawberries in the garden. He loves this and asks to do it every day.

-Sweep up small messes. We ask him to clean up things like spilled dry cheerios with a small dustpan and broom brush.

-Clean up spills. If he accidently spills milk or drops food on the floor, we hand him a towel and have him clean it up. We may have to go back later and “touch up” but we do this when he’s out of site.

-Put laundry in hamper.

-Sort clean socks. We dump out a basket of clean laundry and he puts all the socks in a pile, we’re starting to work on learning how to match them up.

-Put away laundry. We hand him a small stack of folded laundry and tell him where it goes (“put these dishcloths in the bottom drawer”).

He’s usually pretty proud of himself and high fives us afterwards, but of course, there is always the occasional day where he refuses to do anything. But you know, I’m the same way, so I can’t really fault him for that.