Mom Coming Home » The WOHM Years

Mom is Coming Home – To Sick Babies

Mom — Thu, 01 Sep 2005 21:17:01 +0000

It was a beautiful day outside! 80 degrees with a nice breeze. I came home from work and kissed Frank goodbye, rounded up the babies, and went to the doctor. Sadly, 3/5 of my children are sick with a bronchial infection of some type.

It was WAY after lunchtime when we finished at the doctor and I was tempted to stop at McDonald’s on the way home. I reminded myself that it would be better to bank the $20 and give the kids healthy food at home. I made a quick tortilla soup and we had sliced apples w/ peanut butter.

After we ate, I had everyone change into pajamas and they climbed into my bed. I opened the windows and let the warm breeze flow in as I snuggled my sick babies. Once they fell asleep, I took out the laptop and worked for an hour or so.

Even though the day was hectic at first, I did enjoy it.

Edited to add: Our prayers go out to the victims of Hurricane Katrina. Frank and I wish we were in a position to physically go to the hard hit areas and volunteer. It may not be a lot, but we are donating money and will continue to do so over the next few months.

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SAHM Resignation Letter

Mom — Wed, 24 Aug 2005 12:59:54 +0000

It seems people are finding my little site by Googling SAHM Resignation Letter or Stay At Home Resignation Letter. I hope this means that the Googlers out there are ready to ditch the old career in exchange for the rewarding work of SAHM-hood.

I first talked about resigning here. My workplace stole my thunder by laying me off in April 2005. Now that I’m doing this part-time gig with them, I can still hand in a resignation letter when my hubby’s income gets to a higher level.

Ahhhh….the dream is still alive.

I came up with a few example resignation letters. Hopefully you can get some ideas from them.

The basic rule is to keep the letter simple.

Inform your immediate supervisor of your intent to resign and include your title and the company name. Let him/her know when the resignation is effective. Two weeks is the norm in the US. Due to the nature of my job, I would probably stay until my replacement was hired and trained.

If you plan on re-entering the workforce when your kiddos go back to school, then make sure you ask for a letter of recommendation.

Be friendly and don’t burn your bridges. Especially in IT where EVERBODY knows so and so

Also, drop me a comment when you have reached your SAHM milestone! I would love to hear about it.

Ok….here they are:

SAHM Resignation Letter #1:

With regret I submit my resignation from Wee Care Corporation. I have enjoyed my work as Lead Baby Proofer during the last 2 years, but my first priority is my family. I have decided to stay home and raise my children full-time.

To ensure a smooth transition, I plan on staying until the end of the month to assist training my replacement.

I have enjoyed my time with Wee Care. The knowledge and experience I have gained are invaluable. I hope you will provide me with a favorable recommendation when I return to the job market.

Sincerely,

Mom

SAHM Resignation Letter #2:

After much consideration, I have decided to resign from my position as Car Designer from Powell Motors effective two weeks from today. The increasing needs of my growing family require that I am there to care for them full-time.

Please be assured that I will assist in the smooth transfer of my job responsibilities.

Thank you for the opportunity to work for such a great organization, and best wishes for the future success of Powell.

Sincerely,

Mom

SAHM Resignation Letter #3 – This one is geared to NOT coming back after a maternity leave:

I regret to inform you that I am resigning as Food Critic effective September 2, 2005. Although I enjoy my job, at this point in my life family is first priority, and I have decided to stay home after the baby is born.

I deeply appreciate the friendly, yet challenging atmosphere at The Springfield Shopper and the friendships I have gained here.

Best wishes to all of you in the future.

Sincerely,

Mom

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Part-Time SAHM

Mom — Mon, 25 Apr 2005 13:22:39 +0000

Today was my first day part-time. Everything worked out fine last week with the CEO. I even received 6 weeks severance at my old salary and cashed out 3 weeks vacation. This is all going into the bank.

I left at 12:30pm and it felt like I was on lunch when I came home (I only live 10 minutes from work so sometimes I would come home to see dh and the kids), except I didn’t have to go back!

The rehab house closing is set for next week. My husband cannot wait to get started on it. We need to flip it fast and see if we can find another one.

I am working on a new budget, as I am only bringing home half of what I use to make. This is going to be interesting!

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Mom Coming Home – Part-Time

Mom — Tue, 19 Apr 2005 17:07:10 +0000

So the timing of the lay-offs was pretty bad. Thanks for working 80 hour work-weeks for us, good job on the move, but unfortunately we have to let you go. I understand in my situation it was a purely financial decision….it was rather hard to listen to the CEO and IT Director talk about how difficult this was for them on a personal level.

Anyway….the interesting news is that with me leaving it creates a void that needs to be filled – just by a less senior level person for less $$$. Tomorrow the CEO and I have a meeting to iron out details of me working 20 hours a week at my same hourly salary. This is very doable for us, but now I really need to tighten up the budget. I am so excited about being home more with the kids over summer!!! I think by September, we will be in a position to have me come home full time.

I still get to hand in that resignation letter after all!

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I Didn’t Expect the Unexpected

Mom — Mon, 18 Apr 2005 15:54:11 +0000

Fifth round of layoffs today.

I was one of the unfortunate ones.

Apparently, working for the more profitable company meant nothing. The company “hemorrhaging cash” wanted a reduction in the cost of IT services, and I was the reduction. Another 6 people lost their jobs as well.

I am very blessed. We have no debt beyond our mortgage. We have money in savings to see us through. My husband is able to work again. We are all healthy.

Even though this is earlier than expected, Mom is finally coming home!

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Good Intentions?

Mom — Sat, 19 Mar 2005 11:19:27 +0000

Two entries in two months…so much for my New Year’s resolution to blog more. My intentions were good, but my work schedule has been insane! In March, I was responsible for the IT portion of our company move. Due to the sale and downsizing, we needed ¼ the warehousing space. The move went very well and all systems were back up before schedule.

I’ve been spending weekends researching ways to save money. I come across so much information on the web regarding this topic. Some of it is redundant, but I love reading other people’s stories. Two of my favorite websites are:

www.stretcher.com
www.miserlymoms.com

I love the mom coming home stories. I sometimes re-read them when I need motivation or I have doubts about making it on one income. Some good stuff!

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My Original Motivation for this Site

Mom — Mon, 03 Jan 2005 15:09:38 +0000

Back in April 2004, I learned that I was pregnant with our sixth child. That was all the motivation I needed to finally stay home after the baby was born.

A few weeks after we found out, I called the HR contact at my company to inquire about the maternity leave policy. The man rattled off the standard “six weeks for regular delivery” and “eight weeks for c-section”. I think he was afraid to say, “vaginal” but that’s ok.

The kicker was that after the delivery, I would go on short-term disability and only receive 66% of my weekly salary. Amazing. I thought of all the work I do after hours and the crazy calls at home -like the board member who called on a Saturday night needing help logging on to AOL (his son’s AOL at that). All the work I don’t log or really complain to anyone about, because I’m happy to provide the value-added service in order to keep my job.

I guess it worked, because after all the layoffs this consultant is the only one still here. So it floored me that our maternity leave policy wasn’t generous, but I felt thankful that at least we got paid something. Then HR man asks me if the pregnancy was planned. Ok….that went too far. I made a snide comment that we still hadn’t figured out the cause of these mysterious pregnancies and hung up the phone.

Then the phrase, “Mom Coming Home” popped into my head. I must come home, I must find a way to stay home after this baby was born, I thought. And after about five minutes of searching domain name availability, I whipped out my VISA and momcominghome.com was registered.

Unfortunately, we miscarried the baby at 12 weeks in June. It was devastating….because we loved that little baby and were thrilled with the prospect of having a New Years baby. It seemed that God was leading me to stay home….new baby in the new year….fresh start. But He had another plan for our baby and us.

Today was our due date. It has been a long six months, and we haven’t been blessed with another pregnancy yet, but we remain faithful.

A few months after the m/c, I decided to get moving with the site and learn movable type, etc. My husband and I also decided to put the “mom coming home” savings plan into action.

So that’s how this domain name and blog came to be….those few precious weeks of pregnancy pushed us to work towards making the dream become a reality. We aren’t there yet, but we’re close.

Little angel baby…..mommy and daddy will always love you.

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Welcome to 2005!

Mom — Sat, 01 Jan 2005 11:54:49 +0000

Whoo-wee! I am sorry I haven’t updated my blog in ages! I was swept up in the whirlwind of post-layoff madness. Not only did my company downsize, but we also sold a division and I was moved to another company.

The relationships between the companies and investors is rather incestous – but I now work for the company that’s profitable while we lease IT services back to the company that’s hemmoraghing cash. That’s a good thing for now. Having this steady income helps build the “mom at home” savings account.

Can you believe it’s 2005? It feels like Y2K was only yesterday! I’m not really one for resolutions, but the top two I came up with and will stick to are:

#2 Keep up with my blog
#1 Become a SAHM

More to come….

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Another reason to stay home/work at home

Mom — Wed, 01 Dec 2004 09:45:36 +0000

Today, I found out that I survived the fourth round of layoffs (in the past year) at my company. To be honest, I was a little disappointed. If I lost my job, I could accomplish my “mom coming home” mission faster. However, we would lack the financial support during the phase of transitioning me home.

I am very thankful that I have a job during this time, and my heart goes out to my fellow friends and associates here. There is never a good time to lose your job, but I think to find out during the holidays is really rough.

I really can’t wait to come home…..I don’t think Dad and the kids would ever march me into a room, seperated from my peers, and announce that my position at home was being eliminated. At least I hope not

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Why don’t you just stay home?

Mom — Wed, 17 Nov 2004 10:58:36 +0000

I’m having one of those days where I want to quit my financially responsible adult life, go home, and crawl into bed with my babies. We would snuggle, work on their homeschooling, and watch old movies for the rest of the evening.

This morning started out with my 2 1/2 year old crying for me to stay home. My baby’s display of separation anxiety ripped at my heart. I don’t normally feel the “working mom’s” guilt, because I know that I HAD to work full-time after my husband’s accident (I’m working on an About Me page that will explain this in further detail). However, the guilty feelings are creeping up on me because I can’t make my stay at home transition happen quicker.

Recently, I received an e-mail from a well-meaning friend, who wrote, “If you want to be a stay at home mom so badly, why don’t you just stay home now?” If only it were that easy. I wouldn’t be here blogging, but rather handing in my notice immediately! In fact, I’ve daydreamed about that day right down to the exact wording of my resignation letter!

Unfortunately, our reality is that I am the major breadwinner. I cannot stay home until we have generated enough income (from my husband’s business and whatever WAHM business I do). This does not happen overnight. Through careful planning and budgeting, we have paid off most of our debt. We need to have our savings built up enough to get us through some inevitable lean months, when we are both self-employed again. Then I can stay home.

Anyway, I plan on taking a mental health day soon so I can spend a long weekend with my family, review our financial goals, and pray. Oh yeah, and maybe daydream a little.

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