Welcome to the Chaos

Hello everyone and welcome to the Mischief Managing Momma. If you have found yourself here then you are probably looking for some inspiration, validation, encouragement, or maybe even a few laughs at my expense - if so, then you are in the right place. I started this as a way to sort of journal the adventure that is parenting because it is a trip, but definitely not a vacation, this is more of a ‘no one gets any sleep everyone is overwhelmed and overstimulated and can’t wait until we get home’ sort of trip. At least for now anyway. I also wanted to share all things about my faith, homeschooling, links for things we love - but most importantly I want to make the person reading to feel seen. If I can help even 1 person with my words, that’s more than enough for me. You came here for a reason, and whatever the reason is I want you to know: that you are loved, parenting is hard, parenting is wonderful, finding yourself again after becoming a parent is HARD, and whatever else - welcome and let’s journey together!

But first, let’s back up and I will introduce myself - my name is Bailey. I am a 30 (something) stay-at-home mom to 3 wildly energetic and adorable boys, and wife to my handsome husband Nic. I wear many hats but those are my 2 favorite titles. I also homeschool our boys, volunteer at church in kids ministry and worship team, am a dental hygienist by trade, coffee enthusiast (former barista here), book lover, worshipper of Jesus, music is my love language, the outdoors is my happy place (when the temperature is not a billion degrees or to the point that it’s so cold the air hurts my face). There are many layers to us all, so let’s start peeling it back.

I was born and raised on a farm outside of a small town in North Central Iowa (my husband and I have different definitions on what small is but for most of the world, it’s small - where he grew up is just smallER). The youngest of the family, and I do mean youngest in every sense. The baby baby baby of the family, on both sides, it had it pros but also had it’s cons. Pro - wasn’t expected to do as much of the chores as my older brother. Con - no one my age to hang around at family get togethers, often was told I was too young for everything. Pro - older cousins had babies, I got to love on and snuggle a looooot of babies. Con - automatic diaper changer because I was usually the one holding said babies (I don’t even want to change my own kids diapers and now these ‘babies’ are all grown and not a single one of them have changed any of my kids diapers - rude..). I had a pretty typical childhood, and while I may have hated helping with chores when asked and being such a drive away from town before being old enough to drive, I really did enjoy living on the farm. Throughout my time living at home my parents had: cattle, pigs, a goat, chickens, mean roosters, dogs, and cats. Of course they didn’t get a horse until AFTER I moved out. I participated in 4-H and showed cattle, took projects in to be judged, and loved being a part of our county Fair each year. When I was younger I was in tap, ballet, jazz, and tumbling but eventually just did tumbling because that’s what I liked best. Once I got to middle school I had to make a choice because tumbling practice and sports practices were starting to interfere, in the end sports won. I played the clarinet in band for a couple years, learned I absolutely cannot march and play so I was a flag girl instead, which is arguably much better. In high school I tried out and was a part of various activities: student senate, wrestling cheerleader for 1 season, fall musicals x3, volleyball all 4 years, golf x4, youth group and probably others I can’t even remember. While in high school I worked at the local coffee shop and it was my favorite job ever, I loved the chaos on Saturdays, remembering the orders of the regulars, my bosses and coworkers, getting to create drinks during the slow times - some of the best memories were created there. I also worked at a tanning salon and then nannied during the summers as well.

I went to a community college to study dental hygiene as that is the only higher education option to study dental hygiene in Iowa at that time. I’d love to say that college was a breeze but the many, many, many tearful calls to my mom would say otherwise. I was on a waiting list for a couple years to get into the dental hygiene program as it was very competitive, I completed my AA in that time and also worked at Victoria’s secret. Once in the program, it was brutal and I worked my butt off, while still also working. They recommended that you not have a job while in the program due to it being pretty rigorous, but that wasn’t exactly an option. At one point I was a supervisor at VS and working close to 40hrs a week while also doing clinicals, and classes full time (just gearing me up for the never ending marathon that is parenting!). But it was all worth it when I graduated and landed a job right out of college as a hygienist. I absolutely loved being a hygienist, but would come to find out later, I loved being a mom more.

I met my husband Nic while in college, we had had a class together, but didn’t actually start dating until about a year and half later - all thanks to a lovely Iowa blizzard, but that can be a story for another day. We got engaged a few months after I graduated college in 2015, and married a year later in 2016. 2018 is when our biggest, hardest, most wonderful journey began - in June, we welcomed our first sweet baby boy into the world. Our journey to becoming parents wasn’t without some bumps - I suffered 2 miscarriages prior to becoming pregnant with our oldest but I will share more details about that another day.

A little over a year after our oldest was born my husband and I got the itch to make a life change. I was wanting to make the transition to staying home and we both were needing a change of scenery. We both had been born and raised in Iowa, had lived here our whole lives and just decided we wanted to try living somewhere else. We first looked at Colorado, but doors weren’t opening. So we looked at our second choice Arizona, and the doors flew open. So the day after Christmas of 2019, we took a one way flight to Arizona to start a new chapter. Our cars and stuff were a few days away from arriving so we lived in a hotel for about a week. The day after we arrived I realized in the hustle and bustle of moving and celebrating Christmas, something was missing. So I took a test and found out we were pregnant with our second! He was born in September of 2020. We loved our time in Arizona but as the boys were getting older we felt bad that we were so far from their grandparents and we knew they would love to have regular farm visits (both our parents live on farms). So about a couple  weeks after celebrating his first birthday, we packed up and headed back to Iowa. We moved into our house in October of 2021 and in January of 2023 we welcomed our 3rd sweet baby boy.

Fast forward to now and our boys are 6, 4, and 2. In my posts I will refer to them as Mr (color) to protect their identities. We have lived a lot of life from the moment we first heard Mr. Blue cry to now and I’m looking forward to diving deeper into our parenting journey and sharing more information with you in future posts. Until then, I hope you’ve learned a little more about me and we are well on the way to becoming besties.

XOXO, mischief managing momma

Oldest (1)- Mr. Blue

Middle (2) - Mr. Orange

Youngest (3) - Mr. Green