perspective

Being a mother can be frustrating.

Everyday I am faced with at least 148,000 chances to lose my cool.

The days all start to roll together.  New day, same messes.  Over and over and over.  

And each potentially ungrateful moment offers me just a split second to choose grace.  

Will I scold or laugh?  Will my eyes roll or will they look for an opportunity to teach?  Is a mess on the floor worth hurting my child's feelings?  Wasn't he just trying to be a big boy?  

They are learning about the World.  How it works, how they operate in it.  Trying to figure out if they will be accepted, if it's safe to try new things.

I can be angry that my perfectly planned out day was disrupted or I can remember that these little people were given to me.  A gift.  And that they are more important then clean laundry and spotless floors.

At the end of the day, it's all in how I look at it.

It's hard, but I'm choosing to be thankful for my days with small children at my feet.  Thankful for the good moments and thankful for the less then perfect moments.  

Thank you Gabriel for dumping out the Play-Doh.  I had been meaning to throw out the dried up containers anyways.

Thank you Andrew, for leaving empty boxes in the freezer.  I needed a good laugh this morning. (he's my biggest kid and Lord do I love the laughs he gives me everyday!)

Ah Sweet Gabriel.  Thank you for spilling your blue milk.  The floors desperately needed to be mopped anyways.

Double thanks for trying to clean it up by yourself.  You're trying so hard to be a helper.

Every moment, every spill, every potentially frustrating act, a chance to remember that life is about a whole lot more then wiping, scrubbing, scolding.

A chance to show grace, because God knows I need grace shown to me.