Mothering Thoughts.

A couple of weeks ago, I was grocery shopping with my children. They were getting a little restless but, pretty much just being normal kids bored with shopping with their mommy. A nice woman coming down the aisle said to me "I remember when my kids were that age. It goes so fast, enjoy them." I can't count how many times I have heard that and I usually say, "I know, it does go fast." I can remember each of my children being born like it was yesterday. Their first steps, their first words...all of it. I'm reading this terrific book for the second time called Feminine Appeal 7 virtues of a Godly Wife and Mother. This book has challenged me and inspired me to be the kind of wife and mother that God would have me be. It has brought me to a place of reflection and evaluation of my life. One sub-chapter is called Number Our Days and it's referring to the scripture in Psalms where Moses is basically saying that are lives are like brief and fleeting images and then prays "So teach us to number our days." In my own words, I think it means...making our days count.
This has helped me to remember that washing that sinkful of dishes may not be as important as I've made it when my 4 year old son is asking me to stop and play matchbox cars with him or my little daughter is asking my to twirl her like a "princess, ballerina." I've come to realize that the dishes and housework will always be there but, my kids will very soon be grown and gone and I don't want to look back and say "I wish I would've made my time with them count more, and not focused so much on everything else." The time will come when they are off to college and I'm wishing that I could hear their yelling, giggling, and craziness just one more time.
Thinking of that not only brings tears to my eyes but, makes me not want to take a single second of these truly precious moments with my children for granted. Will I stop doing housework altogether? Of course not. But, I won't let it steal my time away from my little ones who are growing so quickly. I'd like to leave you with a quote from a book by Katrina Kennison (it is also quoted in Feminine Appeal)

Just when I figure out how to mother a kindergartner, it seems I have a first-grader

standing before me instead. I have just learned how to love and live with a nine-year-old when the nine-year old vanishes, leaving a preadolescent in his place. They don't stay still long enough

for me to have my fill of them ever, at any stage. "Stop!" I want to shout. "Let's let's just do it this way for awhile, let's stay right here." But, the movement is inexorable-up and out, away into the future.

-Katrina Kennison, Mitten Strings For God (p.217)