Committed: The Ties that Bond
with Angella Dykstra
I'm a mom of three, a professional accountant, and an amateur photographer and writer. I am not a marriage expert. But my husband and I take "Til death do us part" seriously, and here I'll be sharing how we keep our marriage strong while we both do that insane work-life juggle.
Check out my Work It, Mom! profile and my blog, Dutch Blitz.
|
This past weekend my husband and I got to discussing how happy we are at this stage in our lives. We’re leading hectic lives, yes, but we managed to make it through the baby years (mostly) unscathed. We have three neat little kids whom we actually like to spend copious amounts of time with. Don’t get me wrong - bedtime is still a magical time of day, but we don’t start looking forward to it at noon like we used to.
We started talking about the fun stuff that we have coming down the pipe as a family, and individually. Vacations, projects, new hobbies explored. We’re learning to make more time for things we enjoy, as opposed to working all the live long day, and we’re pretty content because of it.
The conversation turned to where we thought we’d be ten years from now. Our kids will be thirteen, fifteen and seventeen (YIKES). We don’t see ourselves living anywhere else but where we are right now - we’ve been here for nine years already and love it all - our home, our friends, our community. My husband’s in a bit of a flux with his career and isn’t sure where he’ll be. I’d like to be doing less (or no) accounting work and more writing/photography work. I think we’ll just be fuller versions of who we are now, but with an impending empty nest (GULP).
How about you? Where do you see yourself in ten years?
Subscribe to blog via RSS
Hmm. In ten years I’d like to have a kid or two but that is kind of scary to say out loud so I’ll just say that in ten years I’d like to have a larger family than I have now
hillary | June 22nd, 2010 at 10:42 am
In 10 years, I’ll be thinking about how to pay for college, get a child through her senior year in HS (yikes!!!!) and what I want to do with my life. I don’t knwo if I’ll already have a house or be thinking of buying a condo in a more “adult” area.
10 years is a long time away! 10 years ago I couldn’t have conceived of my current life, I think I feel that way about the next 10 years too.
Mich | June 22nd, 2010 at 11:19 am
I’m hoping to have graduated!!! by then. Other than that? Well. I’ll have to ruminate on it and then maybe blog about it. What a great blog topic. I feel short on ideas these days. Thanks!
Danica Grunert | June 22nd, 2010 at 11:34 am
Hmmm, in ten years my nest will be mostly empty. My youngest will be 22 and probably either be finishing university or starting his career. My husband and I plan to buy a two seater sports car (so nobody else can come with us!) and get a dog so we’ll have something/someone to dote on. There may even be weekend visits from grandchildren by then as my daughters will be 29 & 24. Ten years…That’s going to come around fast too. As all parents know, time speeds up once you have kids!
Procrastamom | June 22nd, 2010 at 1:43 pm
Good thought.
My older one will be a 13 year old girl. Read into that whatever you like, I’ve got karma working against me with all its might.
My younger one will be 10 and probably finishing 5th grade…like those kids who just streamed out of our school building 30 minutes ago on their last day. Geez. In 10 years my LITTLE one will be one of those giant, matured characters we’re sending to middle school in the fall.
Stunned.
I hope I’m right where I am now. I’d prefer it if my desk were even right here. My husband, I hope, is happy and successful in his career as well. NJ teachers are sitting ducks lately, so God knows. But in my perfect world, we’d both be where we are. Hopefully with the student loans finally paid off and a little more $ in our pockets.
I keep promising myself that I’ll have time to read, write, travel, and do absolutely nothing when my little girls are big girls. So 10 years from now…that sounds about right.
But like Angella, we really do like where we are right now a lot. What a difference from 10 years ago!
Meg | June 23rd, 2010 at 11:23 am
I was at the Elementary School Farewell for the first class I ever taught the other night. There were in Grade 1 at the time. How time flies! I remember how I thought that I woudl show up to their graduation with a small child in tow. Notsomuch. Oh well, my life is full of awesomeness. Maybe when this year’s class is at their Grade 8 Farewell I will have a small child in tow Or maby I will win 55 million dollars tonight!
Heather | June 25th, 2010 at 8:15 am
In ten years I’ll have a 19 year-old, who’s hopefully away (far away) at college, and 14 year-old still at home. Yikes! It’s scary to think that far ahead. I’m barely thinking about next year, when my little one goes to Kindergarten and I won’t have to pay for daycare anymore. I guess then I’ll have to start saving for college.
I don’t know where I will be… profesionally, I mean… I like what I’m doing right now, but I don’t think I’ll be doing this forever… to me, this job is a means to an end: pay the bills… what matters is what I do outside of here… and there are many things I would like to do as soon as I have the time to do them…
Laura | June 25th, 2010 at 8:25 am
We’ll have a teenage son and a preteen daughter in 10 years! Hopefully I’ll have earned tenure somewhere and can relax a little more than now. My husband would like to go back to school, and in 10 years we should be in a place where he can do that.
LMJN | June 25th, 2010 at 2:05 pm
In ten years I will have two 13-year-old daughters. My present plans are to have their vocal chords removed at age 12, place them in boarding school, and go on a 5-year retreat in Tibet or thereabouts, with no access to phone or internet.
Oh, you meant seriously?
I honestly can’t think that far ahead. I sometimes wonder where I’ll be in 10 days.
In 10 years I will be 53 and probably not too excited about long work hours. I hope I will be still be doing something “important,” just a little less of it. I hope I will be able to take my daughters traveling internationally and maybe do some extended charity work as a family. Like, spending a summer working in an orphanage in a third-world country.
10 years ago, I had lots of more specific life goals, some of which have been met, some not. The funny thing is, I don’t care any more if I die without meeting any of those unmet goals. I just want to be there for my daughters until they are ready to get along without me. And of course have fun along the way.
SKL | June 26th, 2010 at 12:10 am