Recently, my friend Bianca (a mother of four like me) said something that gave me a good chuckle: “It seems that half my life is spent dealing with food -- planning for it, shopping for it, fixing it and cleaning up after it.”

I laughed. And then I stopped laughing. Because, wow, she’s right.

In fact, I think the only thing she left off her insightful statement was the other big one: budgeting for it.

I’ve always thought of myself as a frugal shopper. I buy generic whenever possible, and I steer clear of expensive cuts of meat. While I think the idea of organic vegetables is a nice one, in reality, the price tag is too hefty for this family of six. I plan ahead on meals, and I even make special trips to Aldi when I have the chance.

But especially as my kids (and their appetites) are growing, I find myself operating with a nagging sense that I’m not maximizing my grocery budget. I feel like I’m missing something -- surely there must be a more economical way to feed this family.

The girl had Mari by a few inches and at least 20 lbs, and she wasn’t afraid to bulldoze my baby whenever the soccer ball came near. I saw her checking my child -- slamming her girth against Mari’s sides, elbowing her, tripping her with her humongous cleats. Mari, in her first season of soccer, was frustrated by it -- couldn’t figure out how to get past this wall of a girl without being hit/pushed/sliced/knocked down. By game’s end, my Mari was near tears. And when the two teams lined up to shake hands and congratulate each other for a game well played, the little/big girl punched my child in the back. Just flat out punched her in the back and walked away!

Now, you should know I’m not afraid of any 9-year-olds. And, with Mari crying in my arms, I made a point of telling the girl and her coach that there wouldn’t be too much more punching going on on that soccer field. I was mad as heck.

And my husband was mad at me.

This past weekend marked the start of a new era in the Cheung Household. I'll call it The Grad School Days. For the next two years, my husband will be working full time and attending class on Friday nights and Saturdays. I'll be home, holding down the fort, one hand changing the channel to Sesame Street and the other hand lifting my glass of wine.

Phillip is worried about how to put 100% into work, home and school, and I am going around micromanaging our schedules and free time, trying to make the most out of what we have. We're excited and anxious and intimidated. Mostly we're tired. If one child isn't waking up at 3am and wanting to snuggle, the other is tantrumming about having to go to bed in the first place. I don't think they've received the Pull Together and Cooperate Family Memo.

Children are born with a certain sense of urgency about them. At 3 weeks old, Wanda’s needs are all immediate. If her diaper needs changing, “BLAAAAHHHHHH!!!!!!” If her stomach gets less than half full of milk or if the milk in her stomach contains some microscopic component she doesn’t like, “BLAAAHHHHHH!!!!!!” If she suddenly finds herself in the mood for a little cuddle, “BLAAAAHHHHHHHH!!!!!”

And she’s a pretty easy-going chillaxed little baby. She’s not colicky or sick in any way. She’s just young and has needs and wants them filled BEFORE she needs them! I’ve watched my other two kids grow and mature, and their needs seem to be slightly less urgent and immediate than are Wanda’s. Where Wanda needs what she needs 10 minutes ago, Magoo at age 4 only needs things right this second and Laylee at 6 can be persuaded to wait for sometimes as long as an hour with relative patience.

I know their day is coming. It is as certain as wet rain, as sure as the yellow in the sun.

They are, after all, African American girls in America. Home of the free. Land of the brave. Where a black man is the president, but Confederate flags still snap in the Fall winds. It’s only a matter of time. Surely, someone will curl that ugly, searing, poisonous word around the tongue and launch it in my babies’ direction.

I wonder under what circumstance they’ll hear it -- if it’ll be on the school bus or at the playground. Maybe it’ll be a grown-up, too ugly and nasty and cruel to care about how the word will forever sear my children.

When the boy wouldn't eat his dinner tonight, we put on our bright "Oh well!" faces, let him down, and cleared the dishes. But a few hours later we broke down and heated up one of those Costco corn dogs his grandmother introduced him to over the weekend. What are we going to do? Send him to bed without dinner?

"YES!," all the experts shout. "Send him to bed without dinner! He'll eat if he's hungry. He won't starve. He's just exerting the only control he owns." Every single thing I've read explains this in terms even the most clueless mother can understand. My friends with older children nod their heads in sympathy, my mother gently prods, the pediatrician is adamant, and my favorite parenting sites concur: the food battle is a battle that you, the stymied and confused parent, are going to LOSE. So why bother? HE'S NOT GOING TO STARVE!

In our family we say we believe in praying to God, but I’m pretty sure that fairly frequently my kids pray at each other and even more often, they use their prayers as a chance to tell me off.

Magoo’s prayers are usually fairly repetitive. He says, “We thank thee for our family and friends and things and stuff,” and then closes his prayer. He figures this covers most everything important to him in his life without going into unnecessary detail and that if he keeps saying he’s thankful for what he has, there’s a good chance God will keep giving it to him. He rarely asks for anything. When he does, I’m pretty sure the request is directed at me, not The Man Upstairs. This week, for example, he prayed that he could please get to hold Wanda more tomorrow and shot me a meaningful glance.

I never realized how much I do in one day -- until I haven’t been able to do those things. It is like that infamous story of the wife whose husband asked her what she did all day and in order to “show” him, she decided not to do any of those things for one day. The result was complete and utter chaos.

Many moms have giggled over that story and wished they, too, could pull that off. I am here to tell you, when that situation is thrust upon you without your consent, the joke isn’t as funny anymore...

I’m a freelance writer who works from home. For many years I viewed working at home as the ultimate ideal situation for a busy mom, the perfect way to roll together some family time and some professional goals.

It is ideal, in many ways -- I’m thankful for the work I have, especially in such messy economic times. But I’d be lying if I said the work-at-home set up is always a bed of roses -- it’s actually fraught with some significant challenges. Because I specialize in self-induced guilt trips, I cringe to venture a word of complaint. Many women would be very thankful to have this dilemma. I’m thankful to have this dilemma. These guilt trips aren’t especially productive, though. Especially these days, as I find myself in the middle of the most time-consuming project I’ve ever taken on, I need to get serious about finding the best way to strike balance in this tricky set-up.

This is the point in the post where I should tell you all the thoughtful solutions I’ve implemented thus far for setting healthy boundaries.  (Aaaand…you will notice it just got a little quiet.)

The truth is that I’m not exactly overrun with brilliant, thoughtful solutions, though I’ve tried to implement a few common-sense ideas. I try to set a defined space to work, and I stick to it (not always practical, since we don’t have a devoted office space in our home). Whenever it’s realistic, I work when the kids are at school (again, a luxury -- I am baffled, impressed and endlessly curious at how you work-at-home-moms of preschooler and homeschool kids manage).

Mostly I try (oh, how I try) to focus on the task at hand. I know it’s important and healthy to switch gears fully, engaging fully with my family when it’s time to leave work behind. This is easier said than done, some days, when that unfinished chapter or half-written invoice cackles at me from the desk down the hall. It’s entirely too tempting to hop up and finish, popping in and out of my roles so quickly that the boundaries get blurred. Many days, I’ve wondered (with tears of frustration) if the work-at-home arrangement is more geared for people who aren’t as distractible as I seem to be.

I suspect the not-altogether-easy answer lies in the mental discipline of setting boundaries and sticking with them. “The right thing isn’t always the easy thing,” I say to my kids, so many times they mouth the words along with me. It’s some advice I need to turn inward, as I continue to fumble my way through this.

And so I ask you (because I happen to know that the WAHM set-up is one that many readers here share with me): What are your best strategies for navigating the lines between work and home, especially when those two things reside within the same four walls?

I don’t know where they get it from, these chocolate little girl pies with their affinity for baby pink fingernail polish and glossy lips and butterfly necklaces and cute shoes. It’s certainly not from their mother. Most afternoons when Mari and Lila tumble off the school bus and up the front stoop giggling, twists flying, pink fingernails slicing through the air, I greet them in shorts and oversized t-shirts, hair barely combed, lips crackling, finger nails chipped and in serious need of a manicurist’s intervention. Some days, Lila pulls out her strawberry lemon lip balm (she calls it her lipstick) and gently pushes it in my face as I lean in for a “welcome home” smooch. Apparently, the 7-year-old’s got a problem with chapped lips.

Whatever. Clearly, getting red-carpet ready for the after school rush of homework, activities, and dinner isn’t really on my radar.