Parenting

The Prayers of a Soccer Mom

I vividly remember the days of AYSO just ten years ago. My oldest daughter, Abigail, had two long pigtails and an orange jersey. LG was the coach, which meant I got to help haul a mini-van’s worth of stuff to and from the parking lot and fields every Tuesday/Thursday/Saturday. I also got to tow the one and three year old sisters along. It was a tough job. A really tough job. I remember wishing soccer onto my worst enemy…it was just such a heavy load. I had to keep the little sisters entertained and off the field (even though no one probably would have noticed another kid or two in the pack of 8 that were all vying in a tight circle for the ball – they probably would have got some more laughs at all the utter cuteness going on). I used to pray she wouldn’t get hurt, but she would normally bust out of the circle with the ball and head straight to the goal. I brought the extra water for the kids who showed up without any. I was the team photographer and the team mom and the coach’s assistant. Just reminiscing those days surfaces the tears to my eyelids and that burning feeling right behind my nose as I try to hold them back.

Besides church, the way I have created the most friendships in the past 10 years, is without a doubt, on the sidelines of a soccer field. Two states, seven teams, ten pairs of cleats, fourteen coaches, hundreds of teammates, and thousands of plays made by my beautiful daughter, yet, only one mom and one dad to support her through it all. We have cheer-leaded, coached from the sidelines (to the disgruntlement of the coaches), and loved her unconditionally through the good, bad, and downright ugly. I would say we, but if you know my husband, you will know it really is just I, have even been known to humiliate her by screaming a bit too much. I’ve worked on it. A lot. She still can recall the time when she was seven and shot that ball high and made the goal in the corner pocket. It was her most amazing shot ever. She didn’t even mind my whooping and hollering over it. She still has a fear of being goalkeeper as it is her worst position. She gets too bored. She plays better on the move. Thank goodness she never plays there any more…talk about needing a Xanax. I’ve never prayed more in my life then when those offenders broke through the defense and headed toward my Abigail.

Fast forward to this week. It was Abigail’s first chance at getting onto a high school team. She has dreamed of this moment her entire recollected life. We prayed for her success. We all prayed, the whole family. She has worn Mia Hamm’s #9 as a good luck charm since she was old enough to choose. She has probably played soccer more days of her life than she hasn’t. Nerves were high. She has conditioned all summer at 7 am. Yes, ALL summer at SEVEN a.m.!! She’s only 14 and so she doesn’t even drive. Guess who had to get her to the field? Me. I am a soccer mom. It’s my duty. Just like other moms go to work and clock in and sit at their desk and push through the piles of e-mails and paper, I got up, got her up, filled the water jug, made the high protein breakfast, and made sure her soccer bag was stocked with all the soccer necessaries: cleats (check), shin-guards (check), sunscreen (“Mom, I don’t need it, my skin is protected by all these soccer tans – her poor stark white feet), IB profin (for the sore quads that no longer fit into skinny jeans), tennis shoes and regular socks (check – they don’t just play soccer when they get older, they work out HARD). Unlike other working moms I don’t get paid with money. My pay is in my daughter’s happiness.

So I’m sure you can imagine how I was feeling after all these years at working so hard, my payday was on the line, the big mean boss was going to be the deciding factor as to whether or not I would be paid at all. It was up to the boss-coach to make my daughter happy or make her life come to a screeching halt. Why did I sign up for this gig again?

The first day of try-outs went extremely well. She and her dad had forbidden me from watching, but I still stole in a bout of sneaky spying while on my bike-ride. The bike trail passes right by the field (o.k. just a half mile north) but if I watched from the upper fence I knew I wouldn’t be noticed. I could only watch for five minutes before I had to run (o.k. I rode like hell) away from it all. It was just too much to take in: my baby girl with the pony tail (ironically enough about the same length as when she started playing 10 years ago) was cruelly forced up and back the fifty yard line by the bosses. She was doing sprints, high knees, squats, push-ups. I about puked. She was good. She was smart. She was dying! But, she was tough. She was an athlete. She had earned her right to be there. I prayed in gratitude.

Day 2 of tryouts wasn’t so good. I forced myself back to bed after dropping her off. I totally ignored my other three children all morning because I had to hide away and pass the time as quickly as possible. After the three allotted hours of tryouts, I anxiously waited in the mini-van in the parking lot for her to come and give me the news on the chosen players. She really wanted to make that JV team. For fifteen minutes, I abused myself with negativity and reprimand (you should have hired a private coach, you should have paid the money for the club team, you should have bought her the fancier shin-guards.) As the other soccer moms ran to their girls, I stayed put. I didn’t want to chance crying in front of everyone if the news was bad. I watched like a hawk, Abigail’s every step, every movement, every facial expression for any sign of anything. I wanted to steel myself for whatever was to come. She seemed in good spirits? Should I be excited?

She got in the car and told me that they wouldn’t post the results until later in the day on the internet. We started toward home. As we drove, she unloaded. She didn’t do so good. She hurt her back again. My first reaction was BAD, real BAD. “Abigail, you know you have that back problem, why didn’t you stretch better? I dropped you off twenty minutes early this morning!” The tears started rolling, “The coach asked me what was wrong. He said it was all about me in June, but today I looked bad. I told him I hurt my back yesterday.” Soccer momming is brutal, “Oh Abigail, you will never make the team. They aren’t going to want someone injured.” Abigail (my daughter that we often call the mini-borg because she has very little emotion like her dad) started convulsing. I pulled the car over, I couldn’t see through my tears. “I know exactly when I hurt it yesterday, but it was just stiff, until today. I couldn’t play mom. I couldn’t play! It hurt so bad.” I prayed for guidance and strength. “Why didn’t you say anything Abigail?” “I didn’t know it was bad until today.” She had the same injury in the Spring and it was back.

We called LG at work. I told him I would get this baby girl an MRI if I had to. We had to get to the bottom of it. She has to be healthy enough to play soccer. We got her an appointment a few hours out. We waited. We cried some more. Abigail ate the lunch I made for her between sobs. The doctor had no answers. I asked him point-blank three times to give us a diagnosis and he had NOTHING to say but that she should either 1-consider physical therapy, 2-pay the thousands to scan for a very unlikely bulged disk or 3-find another sport. I e-mailed the bosses (I mean coaches) to tell them Abigail’s situation. She was certainly good enough to play on the freshman team which would be trying out tomorrow, but the doctor told us she wasn’t to have any sports for two weeks. Could they grant her a spot based on performance prior to injury? PLEASE!! I begged. Actually, I was totally neutral. I didn’t want to scare them. I prayed for mercy. Abigail without soccer would be like a cat without a tail. (We actually used to have one of those and now it is weird to see cats with tails) Maybe we could move on without soccer. Maybe.

Abigail didn’t make the JV team. We figured her soccer days were over and got her packing to head to girl’s camp. She was happy she would be able to go…she thought she would have to miss it for soccer. As the day went on, her resolve amazed me. As we took the hour and a half drive a day late to camp I told her how proud I was of her. She had handled herself like a pro. (I left out my secret thought that the pros weren’t ever going to happen) I told her I was mostly proud that she cried and that she had feelings. It sucked to see her so sad, but it was nice that she was honest about her utter disappointment. She said, “thanks mom, maybe it’s for the better, I’ve got a lot going on this year.” I knew she was lying. I prayed in parental pride and told God he was good for getting her through the day. I especially thanked him for getting me through the day. Us through one of the hardest days of our lives.

Later that evening I got a response from the Varsity coach. He was the one who had noticed Abigail suffering through that day. He said nice things that made my decade, but most importantly he said that Abigail could have a later try-out, whenever she got healthy. My knees hit the floor through the sobs. I prayed in relief. The rug magically appeared again beneath my feet. I stopped myself from driving another three hours to tell Abigail. It’s three days later and she still doesn’t know the good news. We will drive tonight to pick her up early so she can be back to soccer bright and early tomorrow morning , even if it’s just to watch from the sidelines, she still has a shot at her dream.

I cannot wait to see her face. Thank you, thank you, thank you, God Almighty.

After re-reading this tale, I wonder if she is even going to want to keep playing with her bad back. And then the soccer mom in me smacks the regular mom and tells her to quit thinking crazy.

I am proud of my children. {there, I said it.}

bella-shortstop

All one needs to do is look at my instagram feed to know that I am overly proud of my kids. The other day a friend said that we win as the most photographed family of all time. (proud of it)

As I look over on my feed showing on the right of this blog, 12 of the 20 pictures are of my kids. There is no shame on instagram. That’s probably why I love it so much. (In fact the photo in this post is originally from instagram.)

Even if you find this post a year from now, I can promise that the ratio of my kid pics to my other pics will be about the same. I may have to quit instagramming all together when they move out, or stalk them like paparazzi. [I like the idea of getting a dark pair of sunglasses and an SUV and following them around the country.] Poor kids. They are going to need therapy.

I am a prideful person. Very prideful. Pride is my Achilles heel. I try to keep it in check, but with my kids it seems impossible. As a religious person I have sought answers as to whether or not I am going to go to hell for the way I feel about my kids.

These two quotes from two of my church leaders have been of infinite assistance.

In terms of your happiness, in terms of the matters that make you proud or sad, nothing—I repeat, nothing—will have so profound an effect on you as the way your children turn out. ~Gordon B. Hinckley

I believe there is a difference between being proud of certain things and being prideful. I am proud of many things. I am proud of my wife. I am proud of our children and grandchildren. ~Dieter F. Uchtdorf

I’ve concluded that if God meant for us to never have pride, he would have never given us children. Pride is a parental privilege. It’s an emotion I plan to keep for eternity.

Let me make this clear. My pride for my children is not wrapped up in what they accomplish. They can end up in jail and I will still be proud of them for they are mine and my love for them is infinite. I think every parent should feel this way. The children that I worry for most are the ones that don’t have a beaming parent watching their every move in utter satisfaction. What a great motivator it is for children to want to make their parents more proud than they are already.

Yesterday during Bella’s last softball game of the year I got to really indulge my pride. The best proud mom moments here are easily detected by the amount of tears shed. Yesterday was an all-time contender. You see, Bella caught her first fly ball. I watched her playing at shortstop with great anxiety. This is her first softball season and being the new girl she has mostly been confined to outfield. Playing shortstop was already a big accomplishment. She had missed her first grounder and so when the fly ball went soaring in her direction so did this mom’s anxiety. I wanted nothing more than her success. I was hyper-focused and I feel like some mom magic must have guided that ball right into her glove. Such keen focus is normally reserved for jedis but once in a while if a kid really needs help moms can tap into the force. (o.k. not really – it was all Bella)

She caught that ball. She CAUGHT the ball. She didn’t drop it. She stood there staring at the ball in her glove while her jaw dropped because of her good fortune. [She didn’t know I had jedi powers.] um I mean – She didn’t believe that all those softball practices would actually do her any good. But, they did. She had made the third out of the inning with two threatening runners on base. The smile that came across her face was priceless as was her attempt at covering it up.

I wanted to scream out for the whole world to hear. “She CAUGHT the ball. Ah huh, ah huh, that’s my girl”, but for Bella’s sake I kept my cool and my decibel range in check and said, “way to go Bella” as the tears streamed down my face profusely. I was so glad I was sitting on the front row of the bleachers. I have never been so happy for anyone in all my life. Truthfully. It’s a moment I will never forget as long as I live. My Bella got a moment to be proud of herself.

As her teammates congratulated her in the dugout, I knew that Bella, my daughter with floundering esteem would never be the same. After that fly ball she knew she could accomplish anything. She had her moment and I was there to share in it. I thanked God for the privilege and for the justification in my pride.

Oh yeah, they lost the game, but who cares, my baby had her moment! And so did her very very proud momma.

Close Enough Birthdays

I recently got a kick
out of the blog post
17 Pinterest Fails.

Go over and check out the hilarious photos
of how things appear on Pinterest
and how they look when other
“close enough” moms attempt them.
So funny.

I believe the “close enough” principle is one thing that helps me to have happiness in this crazy modern world we call motherhood where moms seem to fight til death outdoing one another.

Today we had a birthday party for Bella. It was most definitely a “close enough” party. In fact all the parties that we throw (which are only every four years since I hate it so much) are just “close enough”. Except that one we had for my oldest Abigail when she was 7 – that party with 50 kids was AMAZING!

I used to have shame in the fact that throwing a birthday party was so painful for me, but as I’ve gotten older, I’ve stripped myself from the shame. It is what it is. So now instead of cute scrap-booked party tags, the kids have to be happy with anything they can make with computer paper and a sharpie. I checked out of the party competition with other moms and I am working on checking out of all the areas of intense mom competition.

Parties are a lot of unnecessary work for a mom and I am tired. I am obviously capable of a great party: fifty cellophane bags full of beach themed trinkets, a handmade oversized beach scene cake, a firepit, slipnslide, pool, and water games were all involved at Abigail’s award winning shin-dig years ago. One tiny post-party situation is the only thing that keeps me from throwing more parties. After the party when all the kids from all over the world went home, I sat on the couch and couldn’t move for two weeks. I decided that being able to cook my kids dinner was probably more important than party-throwing, and I neatly stashed that fact away in my go-to mom file for future reference.

Maybe all moms should throw a party that colossal just once so that they will know that they can, then they will also know why they will choose not to throw parties anymore? Or maybe they can read this and learn from me? Let it go moms. Have a nice family dinner and sing a song while your kid blows out the candles. When your kid gets invited to the over-the-top party and whines on the way home that his birthday is so lame, kindly remind him that you don’t do that because you figure he needs a mother not in the loony bin more than a bounce house. You might be surprised at how well he will take it. And the bigger surprise is that you will teach your kids that it’s o.k. not to compete.

My kids only get a party every 4 years and they are limited with a budget of $100 towards presents and/or party. (It works really well if you choose certain ages like 4,8,12, and 16…that way when you have multiple children you may luck out and only have to do one party per year.) Yes that $100 is our manipulative effort to forgo the parties all together. It’s amazing how much our kids have learned about their own greediness with this simple rule. When one starts spending birthday money on other people and unnecessary trinkets, it quickly helps one recognize their real friends and needs over wants. Also a good lesson for adults: you don’t have as many close friends as you think AND you really should use most of your gift money to get what you need over what you want.

Or maybe you should just throw one party for their whole childhood and call it close enough? O.k. o.k. that might be cheating.

Swim Lessons Confumed {vlog}

We were on our way home from swim lessons yesterday when Caroline requested that I turn off the loud music. I asked her why she didn’t want the music on. She said, “It just makes me so confumed.” I loved her made up word. At four years old she combined confused with consumed. What an appropriate way of communicating the way the music was making her feel. If we all could just be so eloquent.

Today at swim lessons I got to watch a mom try to wrangle, manipulate, and beg her four year old to participate. The instructor dragged him into the pool for a bit but ended up bringing him back to his coddling mom on the sideline when he just wouldn’t be consoled. The kid never deviated from his standing shivering and screaming “it’s too cold.” I wondered why in the world his mom just didn’t wait another year to sign him up.

For twenty minutes he cried. I thought “what a cry-baby I wonder what that mom is doing wrong”…and then I realized my arrogance and changed the thought to “Wow, that mom must be amazing because God sent her that kid. He knew I couldn’t handle that kid. I should try to be more awesome.” At the given situation, I was exasperated and she was totally calm. I smiled at her and gave her a thumbs up while I read an appropriate line from my newest favorite book Carry On Warrior.

Be confident because you are a child of God. Be humble because everyone else is too.

Really the mom could be screwing the kid up, but guess what? I am too. I looked over to see Caroline insist that she be the motor boat every time. She didn’t think those other kids needed a turn. She’s the baby 6 years younger than the rest of her siblings. She’s kind of spoiled and there’s nothing I can do about the way God timed it.

At swim lessons it’s an equal toss up between chatting with another adult or reading a book while my kids are entertained. You can’t really go wrong with either one if your kid is willing to get in the pool.

Birdwatching with Bella

One way I struggle as a mother is connecting with my children. Bella is particularly challenging for me as she is my little clone. She tends to be very long-winded and extremely needy in that auditory department. Like me, she is an over-sharer.

It is especially challenging for an over-sharer mom who also happens to be a crappy listener to connect with her child who over-shares and doesn’t listen. You can see how that doesn’t work. “Mom, listen to me.” “No Bella, you listen to me!” We go round and round in circles, neither listening and neither caring about what they other has to say.

I would dare say this problem with Bella is my most challenging as a mom, but then 50 more problems that are currently going unnoticed will abruptly come to my attention. So, let’s just say this is one of my hardest challenges.

But,people, I am here to happily report that I made a breakthrough this past week. It was so huge that I called my husband at work and explained it through my tears of joy and gratitude. Maybe my “inloveathome” experiment will actually work after all, a little teeny change at a time?

So, what happened? Let me explain by oversharing. Bear with me.

One of our family traditions is taking a walk around the neighborhood after Sunday dinners. The past two weeks, we happened by our neighbor Sue’s house right as she was settling in to watch the hummingbirds feed for the night. The whole family stopped to chat but both times as the rest of the family went on home, Bella and I settled in to join Sue on her porch. I was delighted to see that Bella loved Sue’s bird sanctuary as much as me. Bella didn’t know it, but I have spent many moments alone in the past with Sue on her porch watching the birds. Bella seemed to fit right in with Sue and I, watching intently, enjoying the quiet, and discussing hummingbirds. We discovered that we all had many questions that needed to be answered about the hummingbirds. Sue suggested we look up the hummingbird mating flight patterns online. Unbeknownst to Sue, with one small sentence, she was an answer to my many many prayers.

The next day, as I arrived home after a long day of errands, Bella approached me while I was folding laundry. She had two papers covered with her own handwriting front and back. She informed me that she had been doing some research about hummingbirds all morning. As Bella proceeded to share what she had written I found that I was completely enthralled. I didn’t want to miss a word of what she had to share. It was as great of interest to me as it was to her and I was able to easily listen as she shared. She was providing a service to me by answering the questions I had voiced the day before. In the moment I felt a great love and appreciation for my Bella in a way I had never experienced before. I loved her for a part of her that has always made me batty. She was over-sharing in a way that I respected. Like me and her dad, Bella showed a great propensity for research. Like me and her dad, Bella showed her love for teaching. I was dumbfounded: what a little miracle she is! And to think that I had never taken the time to notice before? I was ashamed. As soon as Bella left the laundry room, I said a prayer thanking God for making this moment happen. It changed me. It made me into a better mother.

Here is a video of Sue and I enjoying a bluejay on her porch over a year ago. I treasure this small video file for reasons only known to Sue and I. I don’t want to air Sue’s laundry to the internet, but she has experienced two extreme challenges in just a year’s time. At one point I remember writing her a letter while at church: through heavy heavy tears I told her I looked forward to many more excursions on her porch, even though I was 90% sure it was never going to happen. God is good. Miracles abound. I am so grateful for Sue and the time I have spent with her in her piece of heaven called her front-porch. Without Sue I don’t know if I would have ever had this major breakthrough with one of my hardest parenting challenges.

Father of the Year

Photo courtesy of Wave At The Bus.

I just read a wonderful article about a bunch of great dads. It is a must-read. It’ll get your tears flowing in gratitude for so many wonderful men around the world.

The article highlights one of my favorite dads on the planet: Dale Price of WaveAtTheBus fame. He resides close in Utah and has a lovely wife whom I adore.

The article also brings to light some other pretty awesome dads who do things like…

photoshop ewoks into family vacation photos.
hack Donkey Kong so his daughter can play as Pauline to save Mario.
build a spaceship simulator.

and

draws amazing art on his kids’ lunchbags.

As I read through this article this morning I was stunned by my realization:

These best dads didn’t do anything totally out-of-this-world. They did things that any other dad with the same talent could do. They did simple things that accentuated the positive that they already possessed. The difference between them and other successful men in this world was that they used their talent/interest towards their children not away from them. They used their creativity to show their children that they loved them; they included their children and honored their children.

I am the lucky daughter of a dad like that. When I was a kid, there was a newspaper article written about him entitled, “A Man Who Always Has Time For the Children.” My dad did always make time for me and my 6 siblings, and our friends, and a lot of other kids who needed a father figure. He didn’t draw us things or build spaceships or dress up silly but he built awesome tree houses, and left donuts for breakfast, and included us when he was working on the cars (which was often). He spent a lot of time with us in the ocean, installed industrial sized toilet paper dispensers, and videotaped EVERYTHING.

My hubby is also one of the greats out there. He hasn’t hacked Donkey Kong (well at least not that I know of) but he has shared his love of electronics with our daughters, teased them incessantly, taken way more daddy/daughter dates then one can count, and helped with homework. He watches the show Psych with the girls just so they can quote back and forth the funny lines and he has passed along his love for gumballs, beef jerky, and bacon as well as the bands The Beatles and Fun.

The moral of the story:
If you want to be a good dad (or mom),
be good at what you love and be good WITH your children.
You may not get five minutes of fame but you will be called “Best” by the ones that matter most forever.

Summer Sanity

Here are some great ideas for activities you can do for summer. After I told my sister about my trepidation of entertaining my kids on a budget all summer she gave me a great idea: have the kids write down ten to twenty simple activities each (that are free or super cheap) and then put each idea in a hat. Pull them out and assign them each a day of summer on the calendar. We did it and so far so good. I was amazed with how well the kids did coming up with things. It really is true that sometimes they just want their parents’ time more than their money. Some of the things we’ve done so far are a sidewalk chalk competition, a family movie night, bike ride, hike, swimming, baking out of that cookbook Bella got for Christmas. I’ve actually been able to enjoy myself a bit. As shown below. Yeah, it may have only lasted 10 minutes, but this mom of 4 will take what she can get.

If you were reading a few weeks back you’ll remember how I voiced my dread at the impending summer. Well I am happy to announce that I am fairing pretty well so far. After a specific session of marriage counseling that I will elaborate on later I have been able to let go of a lot of the negativity that has been plaguing me. But most of all I have made a specific plan of action that has been working for me.

It’s giving the whole family a balance between activity, productivity, and relaxation. What I love the most is that the plan is SIMPLE. The longer I parent the more I believe in simple. I have found that for me (as well as most others) if things are too elaborate they die down quickly.

So what is this magical plan? It’s based off of this quote:

“The child become a person through work.” ~ Maria Montessori

I want to teach my kids to work. I knew that if I incorporated work into each day that then the activities would be much more appreciated. And they have been.

So what is the plan? Every day this summer includes chore time. Period. It usually doesn’t last more than one hour. I look around the house and give them options of what needs to be done. They choose what they like to do. Lucky for me they all like to do different things.

What is their incentive? SCHOOL CLOTHES! (I don’t know if this will work as well with boys but with girls it has been magical.) It’s a win/win. We would usually buy them clothes anyway, but they can live without them. So if they want the clothes, they have to earn them and if they don’t earn them, no big deal. Every day after chore time they give themselves a tally mark on a piece of paper on the fridge. Every tally mark is worth a $1. By the end of the summer they can earn over $50 and that is all we usually let them spend anyway. (You may want to up the amount symbolized by each tally mark as I know 50 is small, but our kids do most of their shopping at the thrift-store so $50 is sufficient – we’re poor – what can I say)

This idea was inspired by a story I heard from a friend of a returning missionary in Africa. Our church embodies self-reliance and so our outreach efforts across the world are a little different than a lot of those that just do handouts. We look for lasting change, and so we teach people to work. I guess in Africa, we run a program that teaches people to make their own bricks. When they have molded enough bricks, the church then gives them the mortar and helps them construct a home. When I heard this I thought, “Genius, I must find a way to utilize this same theory with my kids.” And so I have. And guess what? My kids love it! They feel accomplished when they work and after they have worked they are happier for a break. They are looking forward to the fruits of their labor in the form of school clothes and they are learning that NO ONE gets something for nothing. It feels good to provide for ourselves and the work is more meaningful now that they see it is affiliated with earning something. It’s no longer a drudgery.

Gosh, I need to affiliate my work as a mother with the long lasting things I am earning so I can let go of the drudgery.

Here is some great food for thought on teaching children the value of work.

Raising Girls

I recently guest posted over at Pearls for Girls about life lessons I feel are important to teach girls.

I am so grateful for my most amazing husband who fathers girls with so much loving concern, patience, and attentiveness. My husband is one of my heroes. As I watch him with my daughters I know how blessed I was to see his kindness from the get-go and to marry him because of it. He has not one mean bone in his body and I can’t think of a better kind of man to father four girls.

Here is a video about raising girls that I just watched and enjoyed. It very much could have been done by my husband.

Affection for Dummies

This video about the dad singing the Beatles with his son has been shared a lot by my friends lately. It’s super cute as the toddler screams, “Don’t let me down.” As I watched it this morning I was thinking about how much pressure parents are under to not” let their kids down” in the affection department. Affection can be tricky as each kid needs it differently.

I struggle with affection. While I was growing up my mom was overly emotional and my dad wasn’t consistent with his emotions (as he was angry one minute and then trying to give you a hug the next.) I think somewhere I convinced myself that affection was not to be trusted.

As a parent this is problematic. Kids need affection. I don’t necessarily like to give it and I have four kids who all need it.

Something funny and educational happened at our house last week at Abigail’s birthday party and it taught me a good lesson about affection.

LG (the hubs) is the YM President in our ward. (He is like a youth pastor to teenage boys – for those who aren’t Mormon) One of LG’s boys was at Abigail’s party and was playing in the backyard with the blue hamster ball as shown. Out of nowhere LG took off racing across the yard and tackled the young man who screamed as he saw my 300 pound husband coming in full force. Jeff quickly (and wisely) ducked into the safety of the ball and easily weathered the collision. We all laughed. When LG reappeared at my side I questioned, “What was that?” He answered, “Oh that’s how guys show affection. We have to rough each other up.” hmm. How would I know that being the mother of 4 girls?

Abigail came home from church the next day relaying how Jeff retold his version of the story. Apparently the terrifying experience had earned him bragging rights in Sunday School and Abigail listened on with pride for her crazy dad.

I put this lesson to use the other night. Abigail is our child that does not like affection. She is especially leery of affection from mom and dad. After a trying talk over our intentions to limit her use of electronics in the evening hours she was upset. As I walked away from her still sulking on the couch I had a stroke of genius: I turned back and tackled her with a hug. We ended up wrestling for a good 15 minutes. She thought if she could beat me she could somehow win back the privilege of taking her cell phone to bed. It wasn’t going to happen. First of all, she can’t beat me and secondly, if she did she still wasn’t taking her cell phone to bed. At the end of the wrestling match, I felt close to Abigail and she was obviously happy about the physical touch.

Who knew after giving birth to four daughters that my hubby actually does have a son? Abigail needs affection in a way that only guys are supposed to understand. No wonder this mother has been failing. I will be on the look-out for other ways to show love to my girls that I have been missing.

I leave you with a great song. We heard it while out shopping the other day and we all love it. The lyrics embody another good lesson about affection.

Pooping in Peace

I felt euphoric in the bathroom a moment ago. I had just finished cleaning my room (which is always the last place to get attention), folding three loads of laundry, and parking Caroline in front of a Barbie movie. Because I had already done a lot of the household duties for the day and given Caroline enough attention this morning (so she was happy to veg and watch TV for a bit), I found myself able to use the restroom in total peace.

I am always astounded to think that there are actually people in this world who don’t know the bliss one can have by just being left alone to do their business. Does anyone else find that motherhood is one big long lesson of learning to appreciate all the things you took for granted before? At least 50% of the time while I am in the bathroom, one of my older kids (who are not so young anymore mind you – 9,11, and 13) comes barging in with non-emergency items of business. I sometimes worry that in my obituary someone will write my catch phrase, “Really? This can’t wait 5 minutes? Get out of my bathroom! Please! Can’t a mom just poop in peace?”

I really wonder if I will become totally constipated once I am an empty-nester. I don’t think my body will know what to do with a completely quiet bathroom.

So while I was in the bathroom just enjoying the moment of peace I pondered on WHY I felt so happy? Was it just the moment of peace and quiet or was it more? I came up with the fact that over the previous 12 hours I had done some things just for me. Last night LG and I snuck away to see the late $5 movie of StarTrek. We had a blast and it was a bit nostalgic for me as we used to watch Star Trek every night at 11 p.m. as newlyweds. (It was the only channel that came in without paying for cable) This morning a friend texted me unexpectedly and we went and got a Jamba Juice together. I am such an extrovert and often forget to feed my personal need for human relations.

So today’s chores (although the same as every other day) didn’t seem typically mundane; I didn’t mind them as much. I was able to power through them and see them for what they are: a necessary evil. Getting them done after I already had some fun and before a nice quiet moment to myself in the bathroom made my life a lot happier today.

Mom advice to myself for the future: sandwich the mundane between the non-mundane and start locking the door to the bathroom.