I totally had a plan for where I thought life was going, I know I will wait while you stop laughing. I had this idea of a gaggle of children, old craftsman house on the edge of a sweet town with a little bit of land and a few alpacas and goats, a workshop, a huge garden. I would spend my days baking bread and making cheese and doing something artistic like painting or sewing and my garden would be this tangle of flowers and veggies. We would spend our days doing a home school unschooling mix. I had a vague idea about a husband who did something that allowed us to live this way and was around for game nights and heavy lifting projects. So reality is a bit, ok a lot, different.

 We live in a duplex with a yard space that comprises a 5 foot strip of clay mud along the side of the house and a narrow driveway. Our house is actually lovely and big. Kids share a giant room that holds all their toys has an attached bathroom and the laundry room. I have my own big bedroom and bathroom. We have a storage/office nook depending on how on top of organization. Then there is a big open living room, dinning room, kitchen space. 
I have 2 kids C, who is almost 9 and obsessed with star wars and harry potter; and L who is 6 and in a unicorn girly artistic. They are amazing, I am biased by they really are the coolest kids. They aren’t easy though. C has celiac and generalized anxiety and L is my true challenge. She has since she was born been fierce independent strong.  She is a bit of a medical drama llama and doesn’t do anything by half. L has sensory processing and indications might be on the autism spectrum, she is so smart but there are indications she has some sort of learning disability going on. She has some other medical stuff that hasn’t been pinned down yet. Issues with knee pain, retained infant reflex. All of which has meant that raising littles has not been easy. 
Pre-mama-hood I was a nanny for nearly 20 years and naively though it would make motherhood and easy transition. (spoiler it didn’t).  I had planned to stay at home in the early years and return to work when they reached school age. Though we would do a home school after school weekends and breaks approach to learning. Instead I found myself a single mom with a one year old and three year old both of who needed weekly therapy for physical and mental heath and the dreams of staying home were gone. So I became a working mama juggling all the things. 

 It was starting to get easier with kids in school to balance work, kids, life and I was making some progress in becoming a person again. I totally though that 2020 was going to be it. Both kids in school, work was good, personal life was good.  We had reached a weekends with dad point in co parenting that seemed to be working.Then mid January he moved across the country. So I went from a couple of kid free nights and time to myself to recharge to solo parenting 100%. I still thought I have this it will be ok I adjusted my schedule to not work on a Friday so I would have a few hours while kids were at school to myself and we had support groups, play dates. Then pandemic and all that went away, kids didn’t have school. finding sitter was soo hard. I was an Essential worker so staying home wasn’t an option. 
We got though it though 5 months and then it was clear going back to school was not going to be a good choice. We had sucked at distance learning I knew it wasn’t going to be a good choice for either kid for this year and the uncertainty of what the school year would be home, in person, computers, nothing was to much for either kid. Which left Home school. So dropped my work hours back to nearly nothing, posted on local groups that I’m providing childcare and in September we are going to be home during the week.