CONTRIBUTED BY HEATHER NORDELL
I thoroughly love being a stay at home Mom. I am so glad I am able to stay home and spend time with my girls. Of course being a stay at Mom is not all sunshine and rainbows. It is very hard work and truthfully it can get a bit lonely. After I had my first daughter we PCSed to a new base and I wasn’t getting out much. I was so starved for adult conversation that I would talk with the cashier at the grocery store like we were long lost friends – much to my husband’s dismay. I some how muddled through and found ways to make friends.
Being experienced and much wiser I was sure this time around things would be different. I was positive this move would be easier and that I would know exactly what to do with my youngest. I was going to jump in with both feet and knew it would be wonderful. But after everything settled down and my oldest was in school I was once again starved for adult or any conversation for that matter. Not that I don’t talk to my 18th month old but our conversations are very one sided. There are only so many things that require a yes or no answer and animal sounds aren’t always a fitting response. So I began looking for ways to get out of the house and meet other Mom’s. I was so happy when I heard about Coffee and Coloring at the Schilling Center.
On Tuesdays from 10am – noon the Schilling Center hosts a wonderful get together. It is the perfect place to mingle and get to know other parents and children. Plus there are free beverages and food which is always enough to lure me to an event! They provide coffee for the adults and juice along with snacks for the little ones. They have crayons and coloring pages available for the older children.
If your kids are still in the crayon eating phase like mine there are also wooden puzzles for them to play with. The room is enclosed so the little ones can run around to their hearts content. There is even a rug in the back for the little ones to roll and play on. The staff and the Schilling Center is wonderful and very accommodating. They were constantly making sure there was enough coffee and snacks and that we all were comfortable. My daughter and I both had a wonderful time at coffee and coloring. My daughter was able to run and play with her peers and I was able to get some much needed adult conversation – it was a very good day!