***Congrats to Heidi who won the $25 shop credit!***
Today’s guest post comes from Lindsey of The Pleated Poppy…and there’s a giveaway this week so be sure to read to the end! Our series on motherhood focuses on all those unexpected things the baby books didn’t quite mention. Sure, there’s lots of information on diaper habits, feeding, and even bug bites…but the every day of the every day is something we learn as we go. Here’s what Lindsey had to say:
as a mom, we have to make choices all. day. long. sure they are little, mostly like what’s for breakfast, can i play outside, can you wipe my buns? and sometimes they are bigger, like is that appropriate, is it ok to say no to good things, and what school are we choosing for our kids? i have found the most exhausting thing as a mom is making choices. in fact, if i really need a break, i usually don’t want time away from my family, i just want a break from making decisions. i don’t want to decide what’s for dinner or who sits where, or if they can have dessert. i just want to be with them!
but besides the sometimes brief reprieve my husband gives me in making choices, we don’t have that luxury as moms. our job is to make wise choices for our families, choices for each child specifically. our choices may be tiny, but they may also be life saving or life changing. no pressure, right? no one said this mom stuff would be easy, but no one said that the first four years of your child’s life you will be making decisions nearly every minute that can save your child’s life. then no one says that the years to follow you will be making decisions that can change your child’s life. the choices get bigger and harder.
one of our big choices we made for our family is to home school. we are blessed to be a part of a hybrid school where we homeschool 3 days a week, and the kids all attend a school for the other 2 days. a win/win for all of us. i can’t imagine sending my kids away for 5 days a week, but i also can’t imagine the weight of the responsibility for being solely in charge of their education 5 days a week! plus the time the kids get to spend with their friends and my time alone to work make it the perfect choice for our family. as much as i love our situation in theory, i daily have to choose to love it in reality.
sometimes i hear my friends (with kids at our school) and they talk about how well school is going, or how quickly they get done, that their kids are doing so much work independently. i get jealous. i think i have it so hard. my days are so different than that. our homeschool days typically start at 9 and end anywhere from 2 to 5. i am not a super rigid teacher. i am not adding extra latin lessons in. this is just the pace that my kids go. more specifically, this is the pace that one of my kids goes at. i have one child who is a slower learner, simply because her attention span is crazy short. i cannot walk away from her without her stopping her work. she gets easily distracted, yet cannot be in a room alone to do her work because even the paint on the walls is distracting to her. my entire day is saying, “do your work”, “point to the problem you’re on”, “what are you working on?”, “focus!”. thankfully, my other daughter is a diligent worker and loves to work independently, and is for the most part really patient when i can’t work with her right away. and my 4 year old… well, we have hardly even started homeschooling with him. i figure he’s got many years ahead of him to be in school – why rush?
so on the days when i’m pulling my hair out from boredom from moving slowly, i have to remind myself why we made this choice. i have to look at what our other options were and realize this is the very best situation for our family, and for our distracted learner specifically. i have to picture her in a classroom with 30+ other kids and realize she would be lost. lost because i was selfish and wanted my time alone, and didn’t want to have to remind my daughter all day long to do her work. because really, the choice for me would be selfish, to not home school. i would do it because it would be easier for me. but some choices are hard and they don’t always feel good. but sometimes we have to choose things even if they don’t feel good. its kind of like eating your veggies even though the cake would taste so much better! (please don’t take this as a jab at people who send their kids to school 5 days a week. we all decide what is right for our families. i just know my heart and my reason for making those choices would be purely to make life easier on myself.)
homeschool is not easy for our family, but it is the best choice for us. just because i don’t love something (or heck, sometimes i don’t even like it!), that doesn’t mean its not the right choice for us. sometimes choosing the hardest thing is the right choice.
In conjunction with our series on motherhood, we are fundraising for other mothers miles away.
Moms who have to give their sweet babies dirty water because there is no other choice.
Or moms who have to travel great distances on foot to get water that is clean. A journey that often takes an entire day. Choices of life and death.
Could you IMAGINE?
So let’s make another choice today: Let’s choose to pitch in and help.
You don’t have to give a lot. You can even give $1. Seriously. If everyone gives $1, it’s a heck of a lot more than if everybody gives $0.
ANNNNNNDDDD…just for fun, Lindsey has offered a $25 credit to her shop to one of YOU!
Here’s how to enter:
1) Leave a comment on this post telling me what you think about the constant making of choices as a mom. (mandatory – 1 entry)
2) Share about our fundraiser/series with your friends! Facebook, tweet, or pin! Leave a comment telling me you did. (1 entry)
3) Donate! 1 entry per dollar donated from Monday 5/21 thru Friday 5/25. Leave a comment! (unlimited!)
A winner will be selected Saturday 5/26. Donation not required to win. But it’s nice. ;)
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Sometimes the decisions that we make as mama’s can be quite overwhelming. I mean seriously daddy told me today, that us what I am here for. I am happy to have decisions to make. I hate when other, uninvolved, people feel they should have a say, but that is life right? I also think that it would be easier if there weren’t so many people standing around telling you how your doing everything wrong.
All the choices and decisions are very overwhelming to me. I am so glad to hear Lindsey mention that. I don’t know that I’ve ever thought about it…but I struggle with some depression/anxiety issues and this is a trigger for me! Too many decisions – and the little ones become impossible for me. I don’t know what to fix for dinner!! ugh! I don’t care what you wear! LOL!! :) I love Lindsey’s blog and her stufff…would love to win! :)
This is a really wonderful post. Oftentimes, the choices overwhelm me and I feel so incapable. I’m thankful God, in His sweet grace, covers up a multitude of sins, even in my well meaning choices. There’s freedom in that!
Carissa at lowercase letters´s last blog post ..our insta-graham life.
I am going through a lot of parenting choices right now that are REALLY hard as I have a son (age 19) that is making some REALLY BAD choices. It’s a struggle on how to communicate with him without pushing him away and I have to have long talks with my daughter (age 17) as she struggles with watching him make these choices and how it affects her life and their relationship. I also have choices to make with regard to her and her friends and letting go enough to let her make choices on her own (she is SUCH a blessing to me right now, I have to say that). I think with each age your child is, there are different choices and struggles to go through as a parent. IT’s a tough job. I love it though. :)
Thanks for the chance at this I LOVE the pleated poppy! I think the constant choices we make as a mommy help us learn as we go. Teaching our children is a very important part of life and our decisions shape our little ones into what they grow into. It is a HUGE responsibility and it’s not one that I take very lightly, in fact I am one to stay stressed out over it almost daily. With God’s grace I make it through each day with laughter, tears and learning points.
I often times feel overwhelmed with the feeling I am not capable, that my decisions will effect him for the rest of his life. All of which is true, yet God’s grace will cover my fails. Praise Him!!! That and laughing off the fails helps too :-)
Being faced with choices all day long CAN be crazy, and an aspect of motherhood I did expect. Ha!
xoxo
I posted to FB!
april´s last blog post ..InstaFriday >> My Projects From Craft Weekend
Choosing my attitude is tricky for me- especially days like this one, where my toddler’s lousy sleep habits get the better of me. Choosing to be cheerful or be grumpy, choosing to pause or to snap. I’m trying to make the better choice, but as Lindsey said, the best choice isn’t always the easy choice.
Rae´s last blog post ..InstaFriday 5.25.12
I am not a mom, can I still comment? ;) I was actually just talking with another single friend about the choice to even become a mother. She and I were discussing how we know the Lord has placed inside of us this desire to be moms and what an honor that is! But we live in a world that does not always approve of this choice. We are both constantly being told (often times by those we love the most) that we should desire a different life. One with lots of money, lots of ‘stuff’ and lots of independence. Really? Not that any of those things are essentially bad, but shouldn’t we desire more in life?
I am so blessed to sit under a pastor who often says that those who will receive the greatest rewards in Heaven are the mothers and the janitors. Those whose work is never through and is often unrecognized.
I commend all of the mothers(including my own) who work tirelessly and love greatly. YOU are a blessing and a gift.
hannah
Hannah´s last blog post ..Instafriday
I pinned it! What a fabulous serious.
hannah
Hannah´s last blog post ..Instafriday
My kids are now 22 & 19 & I sometimes marvel that I raised them for this long. I didn’t lose them or break them or any number of things that happen in many other areas of my life. They also turned out pretty well. At the same time though I also see many ways I would have done things differently if I’d known then what I know now. Isn’t that always the way.
The constant decision making is so wearing some days, but necessary as we are the ones that are the voices for our children. It’s not always fun, but it is definitely important!
Julie S.´s last blog post ..InstaFriday
i love being a mom. i don’t love knowing that i have {and will continue to do so} to make choices that will be wrong. but, it’s a learning process. thank the Lord for His mercies!
melissa´s last blog post ..insta-friday.
this season of life, when all my children are young and needy and dependent fully on me, is full of making the MOST difficult choices that will hopefully lead to children who are older and needy and dependent fully on Him
Agreed that the choices are overwhelming…right now the main issue seems to be what battles to pick and how best to discipline! True also that God’s grace is so sufficient for every choice I make – good or bad!