Am I a SAHM or SAHW ?

I will always be a mom, no doubt about it. Its not even up for discussion, but my role as a mom sure has changed in the past few years.
When all the children were home and I was homeschooling them, it was easy to use the label SAHM (stay at home mom) . I was busy doing the once a month cooking, 4-H, homeschooling, making sure the children did their farm chores and helped in the garden. Plus there was all the sewing for them as I made all their clothes. We were busy teaching them how to be industrious and the list goes on and on. Just about everything I did revolved around raising the children with Emery.
Our kitchen table became a school desk as soon as the breakfast dishes were cleared away and stayed that way most of the day. School posters lined the walls of my kitchen. I was always in the kitchen it seems. Children's Chore charts lined the hallway, and toys filled the shelves in two bedrooms. The clothesline was never empty, it was filled with all sizes of clothing flapping in the wind.
Anyone walking through the door of our house, saw me there in the kitchen. My role as SAHM was clear-cut and I loved every single minute of it.
Now this little 4 letter acronym seems not quite right for me, since its mostly used for moms at home with children at home with them. A quick search on the internet for SAHM, popped up with play groups for SAHM's and blog listings for moms with small children at home. It really is an acronym for moms with children at home with them. It appears I have outgrown that particular acronym.
So what am I then ?
I have thought about it and decided that SAHW sounds pretty good to me, Stay at Home Wife or you could use Woman in place of wife if you want. I am a wife and like being a wife so that was my personal choice.
When the children were first all gone from home, just about daily someone would ask me if I was going back to work and I thought about it some, for a fleeting moment in time, and then decided this is really a pretty good life. I am healthy, so I could work outside the home, but its just so much fun to be home and take a break when I want, not have some boss breathing down my neck, not being told what to do and to cook meals each and every night without being tired after a days work.
Emery never wanted me to work, he tells me he enjoys being spoiled, and we have this religious conviction that a woman should be home. Yes, I know that is terribly old fashioned and yes I know not everyone can do that, but we did it when Emery made under $5 an hour, so sometimes I think more people could do it if they really really wanted to. We just lived "humbly" (I like that word better than "poor as church mice"). When we had all 4 children at home we were making under $30,000 a year. Amazing what can be done on so little.
So here I am no longer a SAHM but still home, joyfully I might add. So from now on when I am giving my bio on the net somewhere I will write SAHW. The role has changed and so didn't the acronym : )
Oh wait, maybe I will be considered a SAHG soon, Stay at Home Grannie.

Its fun looking at old photos and being reminded of just how busy my days were. I keep pretty busy even now, but nothing like when the children were young and our little farm was in full swing. One of the best lesson gained when part of the Mennonite community, was how to work hard and find joy in it. It's a lesson I cherish.

The children around the table for school, Melissa was in college already so she is missing from the picture ( left to right Melanie, Steven and Scott )
Melissa with a new kid
Melanie with LOTS of kids
Steven taking a break from farm chores