Silicon Valley Moms Blog

I’ll turn off my sprinklers before I’ll take a 5 minute shower

My kindergartner came home last week with a ton of information about water conservation.  Apparently there had been a school assembly or something with folks from the water company.  He was so excited to share his new knowledge about how to use less water.  Don’t water our lawn every day!  We only water 3 times a week.  Don’t run the dishwasher until it is full!  Go look in the sink to see that we don’t always run the dishwasher even after it is full.  Take a 5 minute shower! Cough Cough… a what?

A five-minute shower.  Probably sounds pretty easy for a guy.  But for a woman, it’s hard.  Beyond hard.  It’s damn near impossible. And believe me I know.  Not only did my son get the talk on reducing our water consumption, he also got a timer to put in the shower  that beeps LOUDLY at you when you’ve gone over the 5 minute mark.  It’s as if it shouting at you that you are a bad person and destroying the environment with every second you stay in the shower.  Or maybe that’s just how I feel about it.

Remembering my Grandfathers on Veteran's Day

Both of my Grandpas were military men.  Both grew up dirt poor in the rural South.  Both knew what it felt like to go hungry.  Both felt the military was the only option to pull themselves out of deep poverty.

My mom's dad, Skip, was a career Navy man. He enlisted in the Navy when he was just 17.  He loved everything about the Navy - even boot-camp.  I remember my Grandpa saying that it was the first time in his life that he felt like home.  Three square meals a day, a cot to sleep on, and money in his pocket.  He felt like he hit the jackpot. My Grandpa and Grandma lived all over the world during my Grandpa's 20 year service.  All of his four children where conceived or born overseas.

My dad's dad, Woody, was a Marine. Woody was an MP in the Marines.  His job was to pull drunk guys out of bars when they didn't make it back to the base in time for curfew. He survived Malaria twice and was a tough as tough could come.  In fact, he never disciplined his children for fear that he would forget they were just kids and not insubordinate Marines.

For my Grandpas, the military was the only option.  Neither had finished high school.  Neither had any hopes of college - that was for rich boys.  In the military, they learned skills that landed them real jobs when they retired from actively serving their country.  When I look back at the legacy they've left behind, their years in the military changed their lives and the lives of their children and their children's children. 

My child is getting the H1NI Vaccine, why isn’t yours?

I wouldn’t consider myself pro-vaccine.  Sure, my son was stuck in his chubby little thigh right on schedule.  But, honestly, I never considered any other options.  If The Vaccine Book had come out while I was pregnant, I would have chosen to slow-vax my son.  He’d eventually got all his shots, but it wouldn’t have been at 3-5 in one sitting.  Instead the book arrived in stores when I was a mother to a toddler who was already more than half way through the rigors of inoculations.  While it certainly made me feel better about the choice we made to vaccinate accordingly to the traditional schedule, it also made me realize that I probably should have done a lot more research before I blindly trusted my pediatrician. 

Considering that I vaccinated my son against many life-threatening illnesses… illnesses that killed some of my own ancestry when they were children, I never understood why I took such a hard stance against the flu shot.  I’ve, personally, only received the seasonal flu shot twice in my life.  The year I was pregnant and the year I was a mother to a newborn.  My son Darius had the flu shot only once when he was 6 months old.  I didn’t even bother to take in him for the recommended second dose hoping that my continued breastfeeding during the flu season would keep him safe.

Yet nearly five years after his one and only flu shot, I am pulling my son out of school 30 minutes early to drive to our pediatrician’s office to get the H1N1 vaccine. 

Second Harvest Food Bank

Every year my company holds a Volunteer Week.  The company does a fantastic job of proactively identifying volunteer opportunities throughout the year for those who are civic-service minded.  But then in late September, they do a big push to get every employee across the nation to volunteer in their community. There’s an entire website to connect volunteers with projects .  In the Bay Area alone, there were over 25 projects for employees to sign-up.

I picked the one closest to my home.  I’ll admit that I was a little disappointed that it meant that I’d lose three hours on a Saturday morning.  Yes, I was being selfish with my time.  I’m a busy working mom with weekends that can be more stressful than my meeting schedule.  I’d much rather have found a community service project that was in the morning during the week… might as well kill two birds with one stone and get a break from work while serving my community.  But alas, I picked convenience of the local over my desire to play hooky at work.

And on last Saturday, I showed up to the Second Harvest Food Bank with 20 other employees of my company to bag produce for needy families in my community.

Private School was our private choice

I've been keeping a little secret, only sharing amongst close friends and family.  When I've had to tell people about the secret, I've been quick to list of my many reasons for our decision. See, we live in an affluent area with fantastic public schools.  Our neighborhood school is one of the best in the district.  Many think that the home prices here have retained more of their value than other parts of the city strictly due to the great schools.

And yet we chose to send our kindergartner to private school.  Despite living in a great neighborhood with great schools with phenomenal parent participation, we chose to spend an arm and a leg on private school.

Before this summer, I honestly had never even considered sending my son to private school.  I was a product of public education from kindergarten through my university years.  When we bought our house in the real estate peak in 2006, we only looked in neighborhoods with great schools.  While my spouse was on the fence between public and private, I stood my ground.  Public was the only choice for our son. 

Then the economy took a bad turn.  And then the real estate market crashed.  And then California went into a budget crisis like none other. Too many foreclosed homes meant less property tax revenue meant less money for public education.  This summer, our district announced a 50% increase  Kindergarten class size.  Nearly 100 teaching positions in the district were eliminated. Suddenly, I wasn't so sure about our choice to go to our neighborhood school.

One Working Mom's take on the Healthcare Bill

It's true... I love my job... and my employer paid benefits.  That perk of being gainfully employed and having access to high-quality healthcare is probably the #1 reason that I will always continue to work.  Earlier this year, I considered going part-time when my son starts kindergarten next week.  I did all my research about how many hours I could reduce before my healthcare benefits at work would change. I wasn't about to give up those valuable bennies.

I'm know I'm one of the lucky ones.  Not only do I have health insurance for me and my family, the company I work for subsidizes that insurance so that it is affordable to me.  My premium and co-pays are low.  I've never had to decide between paying for health insurance or paying the rent.  I've never been denied insurance based on a pre-existing condition clause or have to appeal when my claim has been denied.

But do you really think that the government can fix all that?  Do you really think all the problems are going to be solved with this bill?  Because if you do, I'd like a hit from the crack pipe you're smoking.

HELP! I canceled the Cable!

   The conversation started months ago.  Maybe even years.  My cost-cutting spouse wanted to cut the cable.  I told him he was crazy! Abso-friggin-lutely crazy!  Television was my escape from the daily grind.  If I had a bad day at work, there was always the comfort of a classic movie on OnDemand brighten my mood.  If I was feeling bad about myself, there was always some jackass on insert-the-name-here Reality Show that proved I was smarter than that guy.  If I needed a break or wanted to cook dinner without interruption, there was always some educational programming that could buy me at least 20 minutes. 

Cable was my security blanket.  An expensive security blanket, but one that I was not willing to give up. 

Or so I thought.

When the economy started to show signs of collapse, my spouse convinced me to reduce our costs.  Digital cable was converted to basic cable.  It cost just $15 a month to have about 40 channels.  Sure, a third of them were in Spanish or some version of QVC, but surely he couldn't argue with just fifteen dollars a month.  Even Mr. Cheapskate could appreciate that, right? 

Lesson from my Grandmother

I just returned from a week long trip visiting my Grandmother in Arkansas with my son and my dad. For every meal, there was four generations eating, drinking, and enjoying one's company.   Every day I asked my Grandmother for a recipe for one of her famous desserts or prodded her to tell stories from when she was a child.  Since I only make it out to visit her every four years I realized that this could very well be the last time I see her alive and I wanted to soak up all that she was willing to teach me.

My Grandmother, Louise, is an 89 year old woman.  Raised on a working farm in rural Arkansas, she still rises before the sun.  She's been growing tomatoes her whole life and can make a Blue Ribbon berry cobbler without having to follow a recipe.  She's tough and sweet.  She's buried two of her four children and her husband. She hates asking for help but generously gives it.  She's survived the real Depression and has been known to hide money in a tin can in her closet. 

My Mom is Nice

Those were the words written on my Mother's Day card, an art project from my son's preschool class.  "My mom is" was written by the teacher and my son had filled in the word "nice."

The card has sat on my desk ever since the Mother's Day Breakfast his school hosted for it's moms.  Every time I look at it, I think "Really?  This is what he thinks of me? That I'm nice?"

Don't get me wrong, I'm thrilled that my kid didn't say something embarrassing like the one mom who had to walk around with a "Mom is a... cougar" card.  Well never know if her son was referring to her fierceness or her preference in men. 

But Nice?  I'm nice? 

It takes a village

Around this time last year, I spent a week in San Francisco on business.  Even though I live in Silicon Valley, my manager and I agreed that the commute was too much for the long hours I was going to work so I booked a week a four-star hotel in the city and went on my merry way. 

I am a Bay Area native and have heard new reports practically my whole life about the "homeless problem" in San Francisco.  When I was newly licensed driver, my dad took me to the city to make sure that I didn't get lost and end up in a bad neighborhood.  Every time I have come to San Francisco, I have seen people living on the streets.  But something about this business trip made me more aware of the issue.  Instead of seeing well dressed financial folks and wide-eyed tourists, I could not take my eyes off the people of the streets.

In fact, my week in San Francisco has haunted me ever since.

I watched a disabled veteran get into a scuffle with a gawking tourist.  I saw men older than my father sleep on the street.  For all the women dressed in glamorous clothes as they power walk to their high-profile job, there was as many homeless women wearing the only clothes they own.  There was more than one man in a wheelchair and a woman asking for money with a baby on her hip.  An elderly man was drinking from a brown paper bag while he sat on the steps of a church. 

My heart raced when I walked down a street where a group of homeless are clustered.  I am not used to this.  It's uncomfortable.  I was afraid.  When did they become the enemy?  Something to be feared instead of someone to save?