is a very different thing than love imagined. -my husband talking about some very dear friends in the process of adoption the other day
“we’re aiming for the first response and living squarely in the reality of the second response.” – silly me in a post about a year ago
“ministry is sometimes messy, isn’t it?” – jeff quoted in another post of mine
oh, so true. if you have little ones around you – you know this is true. if you don’t have any little ones you can still grasp this concept – just think of what you thought being married would be like, everything you imagined, right?
what i imagined having kids to be has turned out to be a different thing altogether than the reality of having them. and having kids is definitely a ministry. you must serve them. you must die to self or else just feel like you’re dying.
i thought every bedtime would be like this one. in reality, this happens about twice a month, and the reason you don’t see my oldest in that picture is because he got sent to bed early for some crime earlier in the day (and my daughter goes to bed earlier than the boys). pictures may be worth a thousand words, but they leave out about a million more.
why am i telling you this? because it’s easy to think we have it all together. we being these bloggers that talk about our faith and our kiddos and our struggles. sometimes we look like we have it all together. ha! i told a friend the other day that i want to set my video camera up in my house and live webcam for everybody to really see the chaos that i live in! stay tuned, maybe i’ll do this sometime, i’m sure it will be quite entertaining!
-unrelated 2 under 2 things (most of these you’ll go, “duh.” but when you’re in the midst of no sleep and fit-throwing little ones sometimes those “duh” things escape even the smartest of us!):
- when your 2 are no longer under 2 and your potty-ing and potty-training at least one – put them on a loose schedule. loose. for instance, we have routines that the boys just expect now and my girl is getting used to. we potty before leaving the house. period. there is no discussion. if you can’t potty or you “just potty-ed” you still have to stand at (or sit on) the potty and “push” (or try). “you don’t have to potty, you just have to try.” if i’ve said it once, i’ve said it a million times. if you’re in a store or restaurant and one of them has to potty – we all go. again – “you don’t have to potty, just try.” before bedtime, “everybody to the potty, (and everybody with me now..) you don’t have to potty, just try.” this keeps you from the constant parade to the potty and from the “huh, he just potty-ed, now that mom’s all the way back to the diaper section in walmart – i want to go, i didn’t get to see the excitement that was the bathroom.” this is not fool-proof, it just cuts down on the potty trips.
- same with sippy cups and food. do it for everybody at once. even if they’re not hungry or thirsty right now. especially, if your oldest is still not old enough to get their own food or drinks. if it’s food, bring them all to the table and let them know it’s hot now, if they’re not hungry they don’t have to eat, they just have to sit and look at it with everybody else. still not hungry when we’re done (or i’m sick of hearing how they’re not hungry!) turn ‘em loose and let ‘em know, that same food will be in the fridge waiting for them when they do get hungry.
- when buckling little ones into the car – buckle the unpredictable one first. usually the toddler. baby is attached or in the carrier. big ones are buckling themselves. toddler gets your attention first. otherwise, they’ll be running around, readjusting your seat, lights, mirror, dumping your drink into your seat, on and on and on…
- start collecting dress-up clothes now for later. after-halloween sales and garage sales. they use their imaginations and love to change clothes and “be” someone else. this was a suggestion from my mentor long ago before mine could play dress up. so good.
- as they get old enough to do art projects (this will be older than you think! otherwise, you’ll just end up way frustrated!) get a box and collect cereal boxes that you empty, syrup containers, peanut butter containers and the like can be run through the dishwasher and stashed. then when boredom hits them, or inspiration hits you, you have instant robots, “mailboxes”, “frisbies”, posters, etc. right when you want them and you don’t have to wait (you know, they’re so good at that!) or empty something you don’t want to empty yet.
once again, i’ll try to stop and save some of these for future posts!
