Hi, friend! I am so glad you have stopped by my little corner of the internet. I hope you’ll take some time to look around and join our wonderful community of moms here as we learn to be better moms together!
As we come to the conclusion of this session of the book club there is a thought that I feel is so appropriate to leave you with. Ultimately…….
We cannot own our life if we don’t first know how to rest.
Does the scenario below sound at all familiar to you??
It's like a page out of Thomas' Snowsuit - you know, the Robert Munsch book about the kid who gets wrapped in layers, goes outside, throws one snowball, then yells that he has to go pee.
Only in my case, it's not pee with my bundled-up three-year-old. It's poop. Every day I ask him if he has to go. He says no. I wrap him up in his snowsuit, he exits the door for about 5 milliseconds, then races in crying because he's desperate to make it to the potty in time. It's a flurry of mittens and neck warmers and hats - and most days, he makes it.
But on this particular one, he doesn't.
I readied myself for what I guessed I had coming.
I was tired, weary, and so far behind . . . in pretty much everything. House, crafts, cooking, laundry, and love. Never enough and not good enough.
Hopelessly behind.
Here I was 7 months pregnant with several other very young children at home. And I just couldn't seem to pull it together.
So I hesitantly approached this seasoned mother - the godly woman and lovely example that she was - to receive the admonition I was sure I deserved.
Waiting for my Get it together and Get tough and Get going. Yes, I had it coming . . . .
But her actual words surprised me.
I've learned over the last 15 years of marriage that loving my husband has made me a better mom. It wasn't until after we had our first child and she began to mimic me that I began to understand this to be true. Now, nearly 14 years after her birth, I have watched our baby girl grow up and become a wonderful young lady. I have also realized that some of her character traits have been influenced directly by the way she sees me love my husband.
Sitting in the dark shadows of my small cozy library as the sun went behind the mountain, found me and one of my older children talking quietly of struggles, challenges, battles of life, and long term endurance. The deep friendship, shaped over years of shared life, had knit our souls quite together.
I wasn't expecting this moment to be a memorable one. Just a normal moment in the dusk of day, that shaped a soul-satisfying memory.
"Mama," my grown child tenderly whispered, "One of the greatest things you have ever accomplished is to keep our family together through love, faith, laying down your own life, and enduring with as much grace as Jesus could give you, so that our lives could be whole, healthy and strong. I know that only God will know the ways you have chosen to give and serve and forgive, when you had to make the choices to do so. But all of us kids have benefitted because you were willing to weather the storms of life for us and hold us together."
