Lord, That I May See

Said to the child found in the bathroom, on her little potty, her underwear down, trying to open a sanitary pad with serious face and pursed lips. Not for a few more years, sweetheart. Do not try to grow up too fast.

I went to Target with the girls. Things that COULD have happened: Toddler crying for snack . . . or water . . . or a random toy that she sees Toddler needing to use the bathroom halfway through the store . . . or having an accident Baby getting hungry and needing to be fed Mommy getting frazzled An all around disaster Things that DID happen: Baby slept Toddler chirped happily Mommy spent money An all around success

I re-read The Screwtape Letters recently. This section is one I have been thinking of frequently in the last few weeks. It is a lesson I need to hear and be reminded of often when my frustration builds in the face of the sheer amount of time that my children require from me and the mere 10-15 minutes a day that I have to myself. ___________________________________________ Now you will find that nothing throws [a human being] into a passion so easily as to find a tract of time which he reckoned on having at his own disposal unexpectedly taken from him . . . [This] throws him out of gear. . . [It] angers him because he regards his time as his own and feels that it is being stolen. You must therefore zealously guard in his mind the curious assumption 'My time is my own.' Let him have the feeling that he starts each day as the lawful possessor of twenty-four hours. . . . You have here a delicate task. The assumption which you want him to go on making is so absurd that, if once it i...

Notes to Self for Today: I won't always have a tired and yet sleepless baby in my arms from the afternoon straight through to the dark of night. I won't be hearing little shrieks and seeing my baby's little body writhe in pain for every evening and night into perpetuity. I won't always be gasping half-formed and desperate prayers to Jesus for strength and patience as the clock passes 11pm, 12am, and then 1am. I won't always be falling asleep at 1am (or 2am) and wishing that the morning would never come. I won't be on the verge of tears half a dozen times a day when it seems to my tired body and mind that I simply CAN'T be a good mother and meet the needs of both my colicky sleepless baby and my weepy, clingy toddler. I won't always be looking into my newborn's crying face and yearning to take away the pain. I won't always be longing for "just a half hour, Lord" when both my children are sleeping. All this too shall pass. I will survive....

His Decalogue for Daily Living: 1. Only for today, I will seek to live the livelong day positively without wishing to solve the problems of my life all at once. 2. Only for today, I will take the greatest care of my appearance: I will dress modestly; I will not raise my voice; I will be courteous in my behavior; I will not criticize anyone; I will not claim to improve or to discipline anyone except myself. 3. Only for today, I will be happy in the certainty that I was created to be happy, not only in the other world but also in this one. 4. Only for today, I will adapt to circumstances, without requiring all circumstances to be adapted to my own wishes. 5. Only for today, I will devote ten minutes of my time to some good reading, remembering that just as food is necessary to the life of the body, so good reading is necessary to the life of the soul. 6. Only for today, I will do one good deed and not tell anyone about it. 7. Only for today, I will do at least one thing I do not like doi...

The things you forget between one baby and the next: --how utterly and royally exhausted you will be, ALL DAY and EVERY DAY for an indefinite amount of time -- how somehow you will always manage to do it, though your eyelids won't open all the way and you just feel like crying --how annoying it will be to fill up the squirt bottle every time (supposedly!), and how you skip it as soon as you can! -- how you swear that you will NEVER have another baby and have to do that whole labor thing again -- how fast things change and little ones grow -- how badly you can just want time to stand still -- how newborns can really squirt that stuff at you if you change them at a bad moment! -- how exquisitely lovely and yet frustratingly time-consuming nursing is -- how you actually won't want to put the baby down or let others hold her, because you want to hold her! -- how beautiful and soft a baby's skin is -- how your happiness is completed by that warm little breathing body on your...