I just got back from a weekend holiday at the beach.

I learned something about myself there.  I learned that I am… FRUMPY.

Sooooo frumpy.  Not just frumpy compared to 20-somethings.  Get real. I wouldn’t even begin that comparison. I mean frumpy compared to other moms of my age and general life status. Seriously, if I don’t turn it around soon then FRUMP might be my destiny.

I’m gonna be honest with you – My pants are too tight.  My waist is disappearing.  I need a transformation.  QUICKLY. (If you don’t know me and are looking at the picture on my about page, believe me, those were better days….)

Frumpy is not a good place to be.  EVER. Especially if you have kids.  There is no other state of being more terrifying to a woman than “frumpy.”

Come on ladies…. admit it. We all remember growing up and fearing the mid-life mom frump.  We vowed that we would never, EVER, be that woman.  We vowed that we would not wear old sweatpants with dirt and paint stains all over them.  We took an oath that we would color our hair before the grey showed.  We would throw out the oversized t-shirts.  We promised ourselves that we would be thin, fashionable and free from wrinkles.  We hoped in our hearts that we would always be more hip than our moms were.  We PRAYED…

And now look at us.  And by us, I mean ME.  Ugh!

How do you know if you have succumbed to MOM FRUMP?  Read on….

There are varying degrees of frump, I’ve discovered.   In the beginning there is fledgling-frump. This is the stage where your hair is in need of a trim, your roots are in need of color, your pants are uncomfortably tight (requiring lots of Spanx action to keep them in place), your complexion is ashen, you’ve noticed the need to apply a lot more makeup lately,  and you have a general feeling of discomfort and unease when a hip mamma walks by.

I consider comfort-frump the second stage.  You are up at least two pant sizes but still manage to look good if you stand at a certain angle.  You cover up your arms a lot because they jiggle a little too much for your liking.  Your hair is definitely in need of professional help but you pull it back so much that it automatically forms into a ponytail by itself in the morning.  (No brushing required.) Most of your pants have elastic waistlines. (This is largely because you refuse to invest in good clothing at this size due to the fact that you have an entire wardrobe of halfway fashionable clothing in your closet.  They just won’t fit and you are being stubborn.)

And the most extreme of all – frumpity-frump.  Two words for you – BRA FAT.  Belly ROLLS. Combine that with oily un-colored hair, no makeup and WalMart clothes.  (Cause, really, who wants to buy “real” clothes at this stage?  If you do buy real clothes, you are gonna cut out the tags anyway.  No WAY are you gonna admit to being that size.) Frumpity frump, frump.

So now I am pissed.  At myself. I no sooner walked in the door from the beach when I began to devise a plan to pull myself out of the MOM FRUMP pit.  Not to sound cliche, but… I’m heading from frumpy to fabulous.

And just to keep myself on track, I’ll blog it all here.   STAY TUNED…

Did you ever wonder how it is that you can know SO MUCH and yet SO LITTLE all at the same time?

I don’t know about you but I’ve got all sorts of stuff crammed into my cranium. My brain is a fountain of knowledge – most is useless, some is important.

I know things like my kid’s daily schedules, their medical records, what kind of chips they like, what their test scores are, who was mean to them on the bus, what their favorite underwear looks like, where their shoes are, why Squidward hates Spongebob, and on and on….

Not to mention big people stuff that I know like when to pay the mortgage, where my grocery card is, how to avoid getting a ticket, how to do my job correctly, how to file taxes, where the best coffee in Frederick is, how to balance my checkbook, where my husband’s keys are…

ENOUGH ALREADY!

I just can’t remember anything else. There is no more room at the inn. I am convinced that I am so filled with information that it is literally oozing out of my ears and quite frankly, nothing else will fit.

That is the only explanation I can offer for my unique ability to forget simple things, like, names of my children or words I learned in kindergarten.

The other day I forgot the word “C U P.” I even concentrated and seriously couldn’t pull the word out of my brain. C U P. (Only three little letters and I totally couldn’t think of it.) This happens to me all the time anymore.

Come to think of it, I also find myself walking aimlessly around my house these days. I start out with a purpose, but then two minutes into it I forget where the heck I was going and why. I just stand there staring blankly.

They” (whoever THEY are) call it MOMNESIA. A mixture of motherhood and amnesia.

And it is real, friends.

Totally real.

A SIDE NOTE: Not too long ago I found some old papers that I wrote in college. (We are talking the 90s here, folks. I’ve had a couple of years to grow intellectually since then.) Well, anyway, I IMPRESSED myself. Wow! I mean there were complete sentences with words that I don’t even know anymore in there. The writing made sense. It had a beginning, middle and end. Phenomenal.

When my Momnesia gets really bad and I want to feel better about myself – I just pull out those old term papers. Instantly I feel like a genius. Makes my student loans suddenly worth it.

The times, they are a changin’ for us moms. Gone are the days when we could arrive on the scene sans makeup, clad on in a stained t-shirt, un-matching pants and a hat.  Oh yes, those days are long gone.  There is a new standard – perfection.

Truthfully, I blame the recent wave of celebumoms. I am talking about the likes of Victoria Beckham, Angelina Jolie, Halle Berry, and Heidi Klum…  They’re beautiful, they’re hip and they have taken motherhood by storm.  These lovely ladies pop kids out and show up on the scene four weeks later with a flat stomach, manicured nails and a fabulous new hairstyle.  In short, they look like they took a vacation instead of an intense experience with labor and delivery.

Was there an option I missed when I had my babies? A “platinum” package or something that was offered to expectant moms?  Because apparently, when filling out my hospital admission forms, I checked the wrong box.  No one ever asked me, “Mrs. Gerlock, would you like the luxury-spa-delivery-option or the you’ll-never-be-the-same-again delivery experience?”  I don’t know.  Maybe they did and I just misinterpreted the second option.  I recall being in a bit of pain at the time…  Perhaps I wasn’t paying close attention.

Given the public’s obsession with all things celebrity, we mothers now find ourselves having to endure countless images on television, in magazines and on the internet of sexy celebumoms with their perfect children clad in designer clothing attending spectacular events.  A very difficult standard for most of us in the real world to live up to.

I don’t know about you, but the last time I felt sexy was in 1994 and that was prior to having children. As for the designer clothing, in my family that would be Target.  Seriously.  I have boys.  Boys go through clothes like I go through chocolate bars.  And for the record, we don’t attend major functions all that much due to the fact that my offspring feel compelled to mortify me at any given opportunity.  No worries, I’ll get them back.  Wait until they are teenagers, I have a plan.

It is not a secret that celebrity moms don’t do it alone.  They have an army of employees at their beck and call – personal trainers, chefs, nannies, housekeepers, assistants, you name it.  What I want to know is how some “normal” moms seem to be doing it also. I see fabulous mommies everywhere now.  Everywhere.  It is a horrifying trend.

There are fab mommies at the park.  Hip mommies on the PTA, and let’s not even discuss the ones who are bikini clad at the pool. Who are these women, where did they come from and how do they look so pulled together?

In light of this new ultra cool mommy movement, I am going to have to rethink my own approach.  Seriously, I have no style.  How can I compete?  I basically pick up random clothing wherever I might be at the moment. Usually it is somewhere like WalMart, Costco or JC Penny.  Hey, if it is semi-cute, under $10, and within an arm’s length– it’s mine!

I just don’t have time to be picky anymore.  Have you tried wardrobe shopping with two small boys?  It can’t be done without loosing your sanity.  The upside of this strategy is that when the inevitable happens, meaning when one of my children pukes on me, I’m not all that upset about it.  Just toss the shirt out and go.

In short, I can offer no explanation for the fabulous mom phenomenon.  Personally, I think they are all just faking it. That is what I’ve decided to believe.  It makes me feel better, anyway.

What I learned about myself today:

I can carry a professional display, two (heavy!) boxes, three bags and one purse through the rain while chatting on a cell phone and balancing a cup of coffee.

I rock.

(Mommy schleping skills totally translate into the working world.)

I was raised by a very imaginative woman. My mother has  the most interesting view of the world around her.  Everything is filled with magic and possibilities.  She is the world’s biggest believer in Santa, has a “real” fairy door mounted on her wall and has always (SERIOUSLY) wanted to be Peter Pan.  She is a barrel of fun and quite a handful!

This is the world in which I grew up.

Because I was raised with this attitude, I also tend to be open to the wonder and magic in the everyday details.  (Not to mention see the humor where others do not.) This is especially true when I am around children.

About six months ago my kids and I discovered the movie Mr. Magorium’s Wonder Emporium. You might have seen it.  Perhaps not.  My kids were given the DVD as a present.

I  L O V E D IT.

Not the acting or the special effects, what I loved MOST of all was the message about believing (finding the magic) in yourself.

There is one specific scene from the film that made a lasting impression on me.  It is when Mr. Magorium is about to “depart.”  He takes his apprentice Mahoney’s face in his hands and says to her, “You life is an occasion.  Rise to it.”

Gave me chills.

I think that quote is my favorite of all time.  It is so relevant.  It is so inspiring.  I repeat it to my children, often.  I never want them to forget it.

There is something you need to know about me – I am a mom of male children. That is incredibly important for you to know going forward. The reason why it is important is because it is the framework for my life. I am surrounded by testosterone.

Wanna know why my blog has so much pink in it? Mom of boys. Wanna know why I am obsessed with running? Mom of boys. Wanna know why I am living a life of chaos and confusion? Well, you get my point.

For the purposes of blogging about my children, I tend to call them by the nicknames Tiny Ninja and Young Jedi. There are a couple of reasons for this – the first is just in case there are any crazies out there… and the second is because it just FITS them.

Tiny Ninja is my oldest. He is in third grade. Like any good childhood Ninja he is skilled various different types of combat like:

• Refusing healthy food items
• Rebuffing my continued pleas to tidy his room
• Rejecting the notion of bathwater

Remarkably, he has also mastered the Ninja skills of stealth and silence at an early age. This is especially useful when stealing cookies and other inappropriate food items right before dinner.

Young Jedi is in second grade. And like any good Jedi, he knows everything about everything. Just ask him. He is wise beyond his years. Traditionally Jedi Masters use the FORCE to fight for peace and justice. Mine is no different. He can routinely be found using FORCE as well as being outspoken regarding fairness and how it relates to his own life in the universe:

• “Hey, he got more time on the video game!”
• “That’s not fair! It is my turn.”
• “They have more soda than me!”

Welcome to my world.