So, I make it to my desk by 9:10, and what do I do, but browse blogs. A temporary distraction -- a way to warm up and start the day. (or so I promise myself as I procrastinate :)
Mac is taking a camp on campus today, so it is giving me a good chance to get into my (relatively distraction free) office early. Today is the first day I am actually enacting this, although I have been getting here around 1 every day and working until she gets out at 4. I think that even after camp is over I will have to keep to this "real" work schedule. Tim is home with Oli and Miles, and I have to hope that they get breakfast. I'm realizing that I am my own worst enemy with time management, and there are some things that I just have to let go of to get other things done.
..and we'll see how that works out, but I'm sure that will be another post for another day.
As I was browsing one of
my favorite blogs, I clicked through a link to one of
her favorite blogs**, which posed excellent questions:
What is the Jesus my children are seeing through me each day?
How do I need to read, pray, fill my own heart, so that what my children and friends draw from is life-giving to them?
What do I need to confess and repent from–complaining spirit, fear, disappointment, critical attitude?
Specifically, what does each child need, at this phase of his life,
from me to encourage with life-giving words, to build up, to love, to
train?
I struggle with being a "
not fun mom," with being tired and cranky a lot, and with having a frustrated tone when I answer the same question for the tenth time, the fifteenth call of "mom," or sometimes, even the
first call of "mom, come here!" I know that it gives the kids a message that I don't want them to have, that they are annoying, that I don't have time for them, or that there are other things that are more important. Every day I wake up determined not to do it, but every day, it happens. For example, this morning, Mac walked downstairs and said to me "Mom, Miles is awake." I was tired, frustrated from staying up late to get work done and then getting up early to get other stuff done, so my response was a grumpy "Of course he is."
That is so, so, wrong.
Not the first thing I should say to Mac, with whom I have been struggling lately. And not the way I should feel about my precious little guy being awake. I quick righted myself, changed my tone, and kept it cheery for the rest of the morning, but I am ashamed of how I acted. And even though I can rationalize it away (I was tired, I couldn't find my coffee measuring scoops, I spoke without thinking), the truth is that it is a pattern that I need to fix. And the questions in the post mentioned above articulated exactly what has been dancing around in my head, and exactly what I needed to think about this morning.
It was the right message at the right time. I hope that I don't forget it.
**I don't really know anything about this blog other than the post I read today, so I am not necessarily endorsing it in any way.
*** I'm sure that this self reflective crap will go away soon and I will get back to posting pictures of the kids. I thrive on not thinking things through too deeply. Denial has been my best friend for 38 years! But sometimes it helps to write it out, so here it is.
