Tag: longmont times-call

Chores, Marriage, and Fairness

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I hate doing chores.

So do my husband, kids, and just about everyone else in the world.

The bummer is that they have to be done – and they have to be done most everyday.

So how do marriages and families get chores done, and remain speaking at the same time?

I was recently interviewed for this really cool article about managing the “chore wars” every couple deals with.  I love how the family in the story talks about splitting up their domestic duties.  Check out this little gem of advice:

“Putting forth effort equals results,” Cary Schram, 42, said. “That’s pretty much my motto at work, and that’s what I think about a lot of times at home. You can have a great job. But if you come home and nobody’s happy, then you’re not happy, no matter how much money you make. We want to be happy.”

You have to work hard to be happy at home.  Love it.

Here’s part of my advice:

“Just remember to give yourself and your partner a break because it’s never going to be fifty-fifty,” she said. “Some days, it’s going to ninety-ten. If your expectation is that it’s going to be fifty-fifty, you’ll always be disappointed.”

Check out the entire article here:

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The Picture of Happiness – Fresh Air and Hard Work

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It’s The Picture of Happiness Month!

Today’s guest is Pam Mellskog, she says:

Working with my Dad on the farm in Galena, Ill., where I grew up makes me happy because it gives me a practical way to thank him and my Mom for all the ways they have loved and helped me over the years.

I shot this photo on April 23, 2006, during my first visit back home to the Midwest from Colorado after becoming a new parent that February with the birth of my son, Carl.

I took off my gloves and took a break from repairing a barbed wire fence in the field with Dad that afternoon to shoot this photo and others — reminders of the countless afternoons we have spent working together in the fresh air since I was a kid.

Fresh air + childhood memories + giving parents = happiness for Pam Mellskog

Fresh air + childhood memories + giving parents = happiness for Pam Mellskog

Pam Mellskog has reported for Longmont’s newspaper, the Times-Call, since 2001. In 2008, she ventured into writing in the first person. She posts her “Mommy Musings” parenting blog on the newspaper’s website at http://mellskog.pmpblogs.com/. Between the lines, readers may sense how the bedlam her three young boys bring to family life simultaneously shreds her nerves and blesses her to the core. For this reason, she likens childrearing to breadmaking. However tedious the kneading, however long the rise time, nothing satisfies her yen for wholesome living more than smelling bread baking, buttering it hot out of the oven and sharing it around.

Pam Mellskog has reported for Longmont, Colorado’s newspaper, the Times-Call, since 2001. In 2008, she ventured into writing in the first person. She posts her “Mommy Musings” parenting blog on the newspaper’s website.
Between the lines, readers may sense how the bedlam her three young boys bring to family life simultaneously shreds her nerves and blesses her to the core. For this reason, she likens childrearing to breadmaking. However tedious the kneading, however long the rise time, nothing satisfies her yen for wholesome living more than smelling bread baking, buttering it hot out of the oven and sharing it around.

Food and Mood: Why Does Comfort Food Make Us Feel Better?

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A few weeks ago a reporter who I have worked with several times called me up to ask about an article.  The catch was, she didn’t want me to comment on stress management tips or parenting techniques like I usually do – she wanted to talk about comfort foods. “Yahoo! Sign me up!” I said. I love to eat and cook – and what is better than comfort food?  Then she asked if she could come to my house with a photographer to actually watch me make some comfort food of my own! After that, she would sit down with my family and eat with us.  I was so flattered and excited that I literally got tears in my eyes as I agreed.

A few days later the reality set in: I had to cook? In front of a bunch of people? And make my own, original recipe? Yikes.

After taking a family poll, it was agreed that our first choice of comfort food meals is homemade macaroni and cheese.  Our second choice was white chocolate pumpkin bread french toast.  After speaking with the reporter and learning that she had already done a feature on mac and cheese, it was determined that I would make the french toast.

Let me just say this: I have A LOT more respect for people who cook on camera, write cookbooks, and cook for a living. It is hard work! I tried to be as organized as I could before the newspaper entourage arrived (can an entourage be made up of 2 people?) – but still found myself scurrying around the kitchen.  I think I was more nervous for this interview than any others I have done – including the ones on television and live radio.

But, I made it! And the best part was my family and I were able to celebrate the accomplishment with fresh comfort food.  Check out the article here:

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Do I look nervous?

 

This experience was so much fun, it has inspired me to add a new feature to the blog: Food and Mood.  Stay tuned to see what it’s all about.

Motherhood and Intended Purposes

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Welcome to Moms’ Month on Dr. Stephanie! This month I will be featuring guest posts from some awesome moms around the country.  They will be sharing tips, tricks, and funny stories about motherhood.  This will be a fun celebration – thanks for joining us!  Today’s author is Pam Mellskog.  Welcome, Pam!

Pam Mellskog is a mom of three boys ages 6, 4, and 2.  She is also a reporter for the Longmont Times-Call newspaper in Colorado.  In addition, Pam writes the blog Mommy Musings. Editor’s note: Her blog is a great read and has some darling pictures of her kids! Check it out!
After I interviewed a local couple for an upcoming article to run on the Longmont Times-Call’s wedding anniversary and engagement page this Saturday, the man invited me into his workshop to look at a black box originally made to be a baby coffin.
This 79-year-old man collected all sorts of antiques – glass milk jars from defunct local dairies, oxen harness fittings, cracked wooden toys, rusty tools and so much more.
Probably a thousand or even 2,000 items filled his workshop and three white-washed semi-trailers parked in a row beside it.
Some objects, such as the crank-driven device with miniature push-broom brushes that fit over a large barrel, were so old and so obsolete that neither of us really knew the object’s intended purpose.
As it turned out, the father who built the baby coffin understood better than us how much times can change.
The man I interviewed on Monday night with his wife of 57 years said that he bought the baby coffin at an estate sale from an elderly man living in rural Nebraska with his elderly wife.
After the birth of one of their children, the then-young Nebraska couple followed the doctor’s orders to prepare for their baby’s impending death.
So, while the bereaved mother tended to the sick child as best as she could, the bereaved father built the coffin – a small, black box with brass studs on the seams long since tarnished to a color as dark as the old paint.
When we lifted the lid, we could see that this father also painted the interior a deep red. Under the lid, he used more black paint to stencil a stylized stork carrying off a sack.
But instead of placing his child in that box shortly after the paint dried, the man built a tray with compartments to fit snugly in it. And for the next many decades, he used the box for tools before emptying it and selling it to the man I interviewed with his wife early this week.
The baby lived.
In the last 24 hours since I touched the baby-coffin-turned-tool-box, I’ve thought more about my third child – a son with special needs related to Down Syndrome.
Once upon a time, society would have doomed Ray, now 2, and put him in some sort of dark box.
Doctors fewer than 50 years ago told parents to institutionalize these babies shortly after their birth and to never think about them again.
But like that old baby coffin, such a child comes with a very different intended purpose –  a life that includes tremendous potential for productivity and belonging and value.
Today, after another long week with my husband being gone on a business trip in the Middle East, I feel so far from being the parenting magazine mom – that woman who plans craft activities a week in advance, wears colorful,  fresh-pressed clothes and never seems to frown or yell or complain.
Trying to work even just 10 hours as a reporter on deadline while taking care of my three boys – ages 2, 4 and 6 – seems foolhardy!
Yet, my job gave back to my family and me this week.
Now, thanks to that interviewee showing me around his place, I have another vivid image of what my intended purpose is and what it is not.