--------- Thanks for joining in on Part 3 of Life with Little People. Make sure you catch up with Part 1 and Part 2!
In her book, “Loving the Little Years” Jankovic challenges us to Sacrifice.
Sacrifice the thing you are doing to work through issues with your children. Sacrifice your peace for their fun, your clean kitchen floor for their help cracking eggs, your quiet moment for their retelling of a dream.
Prioritize your children far and away above the other work you need to get done. They are the only part of your work that really matters.
This has really challenged me. Of course I view my role as a mother as a sacrifice. A worthy calling. but when we get down to the nitty gritty of life, I really don’t want to sacrifice.
-I need to make dinner and I need to make dinner right now.
-After playing with or helping the kids I just sat down at my computer. And all I want is a little time for “me”
I confess that I have been guilty of saying the following
“Kid time is over”
“Mommy just needs 5 minutes to herself”
“I need all kids out of the kitchen NOW”
“Can everyone please stop talking”
Now I am not saying there aren’t times when you might have to say those things. Because sometimes you do need to make dinner without 3 little helpers. But I find myself saying them more than I like. Almost as if what I really am saying is “I’d be a much better mother if I didn’t have all these kids bothering me”
And I have to ask myself…
Am I viewing my children or my role as a mother as a Burden or as a Blessing? As a challenge or as a calling?
I want to joyfully embrace this place God has me…
In this ever so short (yet seemingly long) season of mothering little people.
I want to offer …
my life,
my time,
my heart,
my hugs,
my lap,
my attention,
my all,
my everything.
Sacrifice….
There is saying (I think from the classic book Tyranny of the Urgent) that talks about Choosing the Best over the Good. People talk a lot about choosing the Important over the Urgent…especially with time management, and personal schedules. But with parenting, we must also consider this question.
Am I choosing the Best over the Good?
The Important over the Urgent?
Do I need to do this now? Or can it wait? For me, in order to Choose the Best and the Important… In requires me to Sacrifice. And sadly, I confess… I often don’t want to sacrifice.
I am reminded of an old poem, I first read in the nursery of a family I babysat for in High School:
Song for a Fifth Child
By Ruth Hulburt Hamilton
Mother, oh Mother, come shake out your cloth
empty the dustpan, poison the moth,
hang out the washing and butter the bread,
sew on a button and make up a bed.
Where is the mother whose house is so shocking?
She's up in the nursery, blissfully rocking.
Oh, I've grown shiftless as Little Boy Blue
(lullaby, rockaby, lullaby loo).
Dishes are waiting and bills are past due
(pat-a-cake, darling, and peek, peekaboo).
The shopping's not done and there's nothing for stew
and out in the yard there's a hullabaloo
but I'm playing Kanga and this is my Roo.
Look! Aren't her eyes the most wonderful hue?
(lullaby, rockaby, lullaby loo).
The cleaning and scrubbing will wait till tomorrow,
for children grow up, as I've learned to my sorrow.
So quiet down, cobwebs. Dust go to sleep.
I'm rocking my baby and babies don't keep.
So what about you?
What or where do you need to sacrifice? Wont’ you join me?
As we learn to say No… in order to say Yes.
