My name is Charlotte, sometimes known as Ms Lottie, occasionally as The Slightly Mad Quilt Lady. This is my blog, where you'll find me writing a lot about my quilting and textile arts and a little about my family's life in a small seaside town in New Zealand. Haere mai!

Monday, February 21, 2011

Negotiation gets you everywhere

Our gender roles have changed dramatically over the last few decades.  Mums used to stay at home and look after the children, cook, clean and 'keep house'.  That's just what they did.  Dads used to earn the living in whatever way they could.  Nowadays there is so much more flexibility within society.  Sometimes this is great, but sometimes it makes a family unstable as everyone has different expectations of their own (and everybody else's) roles. 

This was happening in our own family to an extent.  I expected certain things of my husband, he expected certain things from me.  We both thought the other person could mind read and so resentment was brewing.  But now we are working on negotiating our roles and tasks more and we are back to happy. 

Weekend mornings were a sticking point.  But now they are working wonderfully.  Hubby gets to sleep in for as long as he wants.  I get up when the children wake and feed them and get them occupied with something (and work on keeping them fairly quiet).  In return, Hubby cooks dinner both nights.  Fantastic!  We both got something we wanted out of the deal and both conceded something.

And when my children rolled me out of bed early on Saturday morning, I got something extra out of the deal.  I got to see this serene and spectacular dawn.




I think the pinks and purples and oranges (which the photograph does no justice to) stayed in my mind, because when I sat down to make a block for our upcoming guild block game (more on that another day), this is what appeared from under my sewing machine.


I love the sheer boisterous femininity of it!  My husband would probably choke if I tried to make a whole quilt like it and put it on our bed....but then again, all things are up for negotiation!

5 comments:

  1. WOW...what spectacular photo Lottie...I love how the mist is hanging around the hills...Just BEAUTIFUL!
    Pretty quilt square...I think MOST men would hope that some like that will end up on his daughters bed LOL! but as you say...all things are up for negotiation!
    Yay for sorting out role expectations and coming to an understanding. Have a happy weekend!

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  2. Those photo's make you want to get up early, dont they. I came in to write a post and decided I'd check some blogs out first - I'm going to post my morning vista too. And maybe I need to do some negotiating as well. When you live with someone for over 30 years you assume they know things, and quite often they dont!! Love the block and looking forward to finding out the story.

    Cheers

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  3. Nice photo - and block :)

    Its wonderful now we don't need to get up for the kids - they can get their own breakfast! Trouble is I'm so used to waking up early that I actually find it hard to stay in bed! Even when its guilt free:)

    viv in dunedin

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  4. Fantastic dawn photos ... wonderful, what a way to start the day!

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  5. I used to get up early with the kids on Sundays and take them to the park, while hubby slept in. We had a great time as it had ducks at the park as well as swings etc Thinking about it hubby missed out. They grow up so fast just make the most of it, soon they will be teenagers and everything changes!

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