14 Hours Til Bedtime: A Stay-at-Home Mom's Life in 27 Funny Little Stories

Ralph Schoenstein, author of "My Kid's an Honor Student. Your Kid's a Loser."
Somewhere Erma Bombeck is smiling.


Lisa Earle McCleod, author of "Forget Perfect"
"14 hours 'Til Bedtime" is like a good laugh with a girlfriend.


Ken Swarner, author of Whose Kids Are These Anyway?
Jen Singer has hit parenting on the nail...it's hectic, loud and mind numbing yet worth its weight in gold.


Book Description
Short, funny, and honest…like your kids. A breath of fresh air in the parenting world, "14 Hours ‘Til Bedtime" illuminates the pressure cooker lives of America’s young mothers. With comedic focus on the joys and the blunders of raising a family, Jen Singer explores what it really takes to be a stay-at-home mom: Patience…stamina…and a genuine appreciation for greeting cards made out of Froot Loops. "14 Hours ‘Til Bedtime" is for any mother who has managed to do the Hokey-Pokey with a toddler while nursing the baby at the same time. Author Jen Singer is the sure-and-steady voice for every on-the-go mom who dreams of stringing together ten minutes so she can shave both legs on the same day.


From the Publisher
Truly laugh-out-loud funny, Jen Singer is the voice of today's over-worked moms! Recently she was quoted in "The Boston Herald" October 1, 2004: "Americans love to see privileged people fall, and (now) it’s housewives’ turn," said Jen Singer, author of 14 Hours 'Til Bedtime: A Stay-at-Home Mom’s Life in 27 Funny Little Stories and creator of MommaSaid.net.       "For the past few years, staying home with your kids has been seen as a privilege," she said. "Watching Desperate Housewives lets working women feel relieved that being a housewife isn't what society has held it up to be. And at-home moms want to know that other housewives can be as unhappy or more so than they feel sometimes."


From the Inside Flap
Introduction In my mother’s day, being a stay-at-home mom was practically mandatory. Nowadays though, with so many moms working to make ends meet, staying home with the kids is seen as a privilege. And the privileged shouldn’t complain. Then again, the privileged normally don’t spend their days scraping peanut butter off the telephone or rescuing the cat from yet another tea party. So, an entire generation of stay-at-home moms, who grew up when women were suddenly expected to "bring home the bacon and fry it up in a pan," seems to downplay their (unpaid) jobs. Yet they work 14-plus hour days, putting aside their own interests - such as conversing with adults in full sentences - with little recognition. Or sleep. In "14 Hours ‘Til Bedtime: A Stay-at-Home Mom’s Life in 27 Funny, Little Stories", I say what other at-home moms have been afraid to say: it’s really, really hard to devote all your time to little people who show their appreciation by hanging from your belt loops, whining, while you make macaroni and cheese shaped like SpongeBob SquarePants. Again.Between each story are "Just a Minute!" breaks - quick, little funnies you can read while stirring the mac n’ cheese. Even the essays are brief, because I know you have only about 750 words to read before someone figures out you’re hiding in the bathroom with a book. So go ahead. Read a little bit and enjoy. Because you deserve it, Mom! - Jen Singer, May 2004


About the Author
Author Jen Singer is the stay-at-home mother of two small boys. When they're sleeping or tearing down someone else's house, Singer writes about them, secure in the knowledge that they can't read too well yet. Her humor has appeared in American Baby, Family Circle, The New York Times, Nick Jr., Parenting, Parents, and Woman's Day. Before she began taking phone messages in chalk on the driveway, she wrote about Generation X in Entrepreneur, The Boston Globe, The Chicago Tribune, Home Office Computing, The Los Angeles Times, and The Miami Herald. She is the creator of the "Housewife" Awards™" and the holiday, "Please Take My Children to Work Day", and the founder of MommaSaid.net.


Excerpted from 14 Hours Til Bedtime: A Stay-At-Home Mom's Life in 27 Funny Little Stories by Jen Singer. Copyright © 2004. Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
Chapter One - How to Succeed at Motherhood without Really Trying Shifting from working girl to stay-at-home mom can cause culture shock. Anything you learned in the workplace no longer applies. Or does it? Transfer: Moving the baby from your right arm to your left. Downsize: When you finally fit into your pre-pregnancy jeans again. Floating Holiday: Spending Labor Day in the kiddie pool, trying to keep your kids from drowning each other. Receptionist: Your four-year-old, who has just discovered the Talk button on your cordless phone. Excused Absence: Surgery. Or a full body cast. Otherwise, you’re pretty much on duty all the time. Company Picnic: Ice pops and tee-ball in the driveway on a warm Tuesday afternoon. Performance Review: Annually, in bed, on Mother’s Day. You’ve done a good job when you receive homemade greeting cards, flowers and what appear to be Froot Loops mixed with grapes and chocolate chips. Equal Opportunity Policy: Everyone is given an equal opportunity to fold the laundry, but you’re the only one who ever takes it. Reception Area: The spot near the door where the kids shower Daddy with hugs and accolades, even though you’re the one who just spent eleven hours making new outfits for Barbie, reading You Can Name 100 Cars twenty-three times and vacuuming dried Play-Doh from between the couch cushions. Sick Day: Doing the same thing you do every day, only you feel worse than you normally do. Company Stationery: Whatever scrap of paper you can find to scribble a note to the teacher on before the bus arrives - usually, the back of a Toys "R" Us receipt. Layoff: "Would you lay off the Cheese Doodles? I’m making dinner!" Environmental Protection Compliance: A Diaper Genie and a can of Lysol. Company Parking: Between the tricycles and the recycling containers. Multi-Tasking: Emptying the dishwasher, filling sippy cups with apple juice and calling your child in sick (again) to the school nurse - all at the same time. Overtime: Over time, most stay-at-home moms realize there is no overtime in a job that never ends. Maternity Leave: The hour or so you get to yourself while the hospital nurses clean, weigh and put that cute little pink or blue hat on your newborn. 9 to 5: A half-day.


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