This chapter is a window into one of the many moments that shaped my journey as a mother—proof that survival and creativity can coexist, even in the most unpredictable circumstances. It’s a story of struggle, adaptation, and finding joy where others might only see obstacles. Through makeshift racetracks, nature walks, and sporadic side hustles long before they were being utilized, I learned that thriving isn’t about having it all—it’s about making the most of what you do have. This is just one piece of the bigger story, a testament to the resilience of motherhood and the beauty of improvization.

I understand how exhausting it is just trying to conquer JUST the everyday regular tasks that just the idea of trying to fit something that enriching seems unachievable.   In fact, just reading the title of this post may have been a task at this point in your long, accomplished day that has brought you to the point that you are running into the same pattern of thinking as you regularly fall into which is just wondering if you are failing or if you are doing it right.  It’s completely natural to have these doubts when you are a parent.  We often see these admirable mothers on Tik Tok doing these creative DIY videos and you can’t help but have your eyes wander into the video background and admire how they are living so successfully (by the decor and appliances its a given) and just  just envying their lives and wondering to yourself like, “how do they do it?” You don’t even like taking prescheduled family photos let alone throw together a few second TikTok video t⅘ because you feel this overwhelming amount of pressure to clean up everything that might be visible in the background plus getting yourself together, find the uninterrupted time and then the drive to actually complete the great idea you had that now has lost that spark bc of all you had to do to prepare for it.  I get it.  You somehow have gotten so lost in the idea that you aren’t being practical in what your expectations are.  You are comparing yourself to someone who has already started out with the financial cushion to have to availability to generate content full time and have housekeepers or namnys that they don’t invite on screen as guests to psy homage to.  You are setting yourself up by thinking that you are falling short by making the mistake of having standards that you are basing off of a life you honestly,  don’t have!

And that’s completely OK! You are perfectly fine not having  a task  on your To-Do-List  one to contact your designer overseas about the imported tiles for your bathroom remodel in the guest house.  That sounds good and all but in all reality a large percent of people who spend money frivolous not only have the financial backing to make such purchases but, they are doing such activities because of a deficit in their lives they are attempting to fill with other things hoping to get some fulfillment. 

Time spent accessing what you don’t have is time wasted.

I’m not ashamed to admit that since I became a mother, we have struggled financially more often than not at all. Without divulging too much personal details, we’ve had times where as a family,  we had lost everything, homeless, attempting to get assistance in times where I was completely ignorant to how difficult it is to get any assistance in desperate times unless you are making some huge sacrifice when you are already at such a huge disadvantage to begin with.   I could go on for days about how much of a disappointment it was to discover how the system actually operated and I assumed that if you were in a state of crisis that there were state and local programs available to assist you. I quickly found out the process was not that simple. The reality is that the waiting lists to be eligible for services for housing assistance is so behind and many who have been waiting for a more affordable living arrangement have been waiting over a decade to get a call to start the application process. It was a hard pill to swallow once I saw the complexity of getting help, i was dumbfounded as I unfortunately was not informed of these processes growing up.  Being so closed off from anyone experiencing poverty or individuals who fell on hard times was not something i ever had to witness or experience so i was completely ignorant to it all and once i was faced with it later in life i realized right away the harsh truth and that i needed to figure out some alternatives and fast. Now, fast forwarding years later i have educated myself on what kinds of assistance i can utilize depending on what the immediate need is and once i was able to get a netter understanding of these resources as a whole shared with many others ee encountered along our journey that also were unaware of the proper way to navigate getting help and its enough information ive gathered that is enough for an entirely other blog post. If someone stumbles across this post and is in need of some help in their own struggle then please leave a comment at the bottom requesting i create a blog posting specific to assistance and Id be more then happy to pass on what ive learned along the way to help simplify the process for you.  But like i said,  that’s for another post. I just wanted to mention it briefly to properly convey the degree of circumstances that we were living in for quite some time and because i was not able to find a quick and easy way out of these difficulties we were finding ourselved in quite frequently i refused to just give up and succumb to being overwhelmed with it all.  I called my self into action and tapped into reaching deep into creating various opportunities to make money with creative endeavors that at the same time i successfully carried it out and reaped the rewards i not only was compensated but the more i was able to find a way outta nothing, my confidence boosted more and more with each prospect and i was able to build a legitimate creative business and pretty extensive clientile base in the process.  It also restored my self confidence and stopped my naturally pessimistic thought process all the time because my mind was consumed with creating.  It was a great eye openimg realization most importantly because of how little our circumstances going on in our lives mattered anymore to my children because I changed my thoughts and my speech too and inspired them to readjust their own perspective with mind.  The focus on what we didn’t have and what we were struggling to  manage financially became less noticeable and energy was redistributed into positivity and creativity and those are the experiences that they still remember now, years later and the ones that are core memories imprinted in their minds that left a lastimg impression. 

In fact, looking through a old album of photos with my two sons whom are now 11 and 12 the other day we stumbled upon one collection that took place during a very difficult little phase when they were toddler age.  Their father and I jumped too quickly into a lease  after being denied a few places when I was pregnant with our first son due to a lack of rental and credit history. We had spent so much money on application fees and so much time on high hopes and being let down that our desperation turned into a 2 year long nightmare of kerosene and black mold.  Additionally,  slum lords who had no issue to blatantly break laws and boldly accept fines because they obviously had the money to pay the fines and also pay the bribes to city officially to pass codes that shouldnt have been overlooked. We found ourselves being forced into residing long term in a extended stay hotel and it equating to my rent x 2 to remain there while we went through court proceedings.  During this time, we STRUGGLED to pay close to $75 a day.  Their father worked 12 hour days and even more after work doing side work while I went straight to formulating what is now considered a creative business. I literally scrolled through Pinterest for inspiration and what I could create with the supplies i had on hand already and if other supplies were needed then it would be affordable and id still make a profit afterwards. 

I tried to turn our misfortune into a new adventure nearly each day, no matter what was on our plate. I would find myself getting into that pit of despair as I would start to tally up all the things we had that were working against us and then i would just look at them over on the floor playing with their matchbox cars taking empty toliet paper rolls for tunnels and just having a ball with the bare minimum and it all seemed to dissipate. I started to check myself and say YOU, AMANDA, are the one who is having unrealistic expectations for yourself at this current time. You need to take a look at all the good and go from there.  Some days were harder then most and maybe all I had to be grateful for was a few hours in a bed and healthy children and I was barely able to come up with any money that day but had just enough to feed them that day and I would go without likely so they didn’t have to. I’d take advantage of the opportunity to sleep comfortably and turn in earlier then I typically would so I could get up at the Crack of dawn and start my mission to not go another day hungry and just barely being able to feed them. My next day would typically be prosperous and I’d make enough to cover accommodations, food and potentially be able to take a day off of our reoccurring hustle and bustle .

My sons had told me the other day as we drove by that sane extended stay we stayed in the first time we faced homelessness and their interpretation was how much fun they remembered that they had there. Where I looked in cringed is where they experienced great memories. So it’s not about the scenery. Or the caliber or quantity of toys and if you have all the pieces from the entire collection. It’s the intent. It’s what you make from what you have.

That same day I spoke of before when I was recalling them with their matchbox cars, that day I  stopped what I was doing and got down on the floor with them And took masking tape and made a racetrack (with multiple lanes) that took the entire length of the little sitting area in our little efficiency hotel room…it bounced off the wall and upside down.I adhesed paper towel and paper towel holders in places for tunnels in different parts. That kept them both busy for 3+ hrs beside nap and a few after.

That gave me the time to get some ideas for craft ideas to sell at my daughters PTA Sponsored holiday craft show I was attending in a few weeks. Some of the supplies from some of the crafts i made we could get from nature and we regularly would take our adventure outdoors and go on hikes where  we discovered all kinds of habitats and explored new areas, ran off energy, had a picnic (or ate on way home in the car) and they slept great at naptime so I had time alone to make these masterpieces without 2 extra sets of hands who wanted so desperately to assist me.

Of course i wasnt always able to do things without them wanting to contribute so i built off their acts of generosity and did the first run of the next craft keepsake i was wanting to advertise with them individually starting out. Of course it was an opportunity to do something fun with one another and 2 new additions added into our keepsake collection but also at the same time I could take their creations and snap photos of them and post them on social media as an opportunity ton market was first making a few with them to keep as keepsakes of course and also showcase one I made that I’d include I could personalize and customize to their request. It was a way I was running my local craft business for online visibility before it was actually a industry thar has become so popular today for moms that are at home.

I eventually found a way to showcase all my abilities and expanded more and more with my range just becoming more extended each time I wanted to try another option I never explored. I’d set out to make each and every day a new exploration or adventure for us that probably from the outside we definitely looked nuts coming in with bags of pinecones and sticks through the hotel lobby in need of a bath and tick check. I remember one time we discovered a number of mulberry trees on the property directly behind one of the extended stay kinds of hotels and we wemt mulberry picking. We looked up ways to make homemade little pies (which were nasty and we just chocked it up as a loss and walked and got ice cream from the grocery store for milkshakes) and while picking berries discovered Like 9 huge groundhog holes and a bunch of other things that sparked their curiosity that were just highlights that we had pop up while we were exploring.

I let go of obsessing and stressing over what was going on and focused on how I could improve it financially and most of all psychologically. I didn’t sit back and wonder if I was failing. I assumed for so long that I was falling short in the areas in which I thought were essential. That was my mistake. I was paying attention to what everyone else was doing sucessfully that I wasnt. The more I stepped away from comparing myself to the next person and how their lives were vs my own, the more I grew to see how much of a blessing it was to NOT relate. To not be like them. To be able to not only see the need for their to be a change from the norm. There is such beauty in individuality. I embraced things I remembered from my own childhood that held such a deep meaning to me and passed a rendition of it off to my children and told them stories about my own experiences to go along with it to give them a glimpse into the past and give them a mental picture of my own history.

Most of all, keeping the magic alive was the most important thing. Taking our current circumstances that were a huge change from regularly scheduled programming and making it into a adventure despite the actual circumstances being unfortunate and there were so many things we could have focused on that weren’t in our favor we chose to focus on the things that we could do to make each day we experienced in those difficult times, just another day to make a new adventure.

It didn’t just stop with the nature walks. We went thrifting in other n early cities and took the back roads and sang songs and admired the scenery and stopped at times (potty training pit stops) to chat with cows or horses that were closely or park and walk down to a little pond to look for visible fish and see who could count to the highest number and my oldest would always cheat saying he saw an astronomical amount along with some crazy species that was extinct ions ago bur swear he had a super power to see in great depths past what him and his brother were able to.

I’m not encouraging to be oblivious and live in a delusional state to acknowledge and change your circumstances into a better place. You will do that off the mommy clock. I’m talking about how it’s possible to multitask all these things realistically in spite of your bank account balance or address. It’s up to you to create those things you made into decent humans and not have to raise grown men who have trauma they need to heal from because of their childhood you had them miserable because you were miserable too. It doesn’t take alot to do that. You owe them that. Don’t you think?