Punishment...

I've been thinking lately. I must have done something either in my childhood, or in the pre-existence, that made the Lord think 'Sarah Harward really could use some punishing. I know, let's send her a 3 year old demon child, who she'll love SO much and think is just great, but he'll spend all of his time thinking of ways to torment her. Yeah, that will be fun to watch...'

Okay, I'm not sure if the Lord was actually thinking that, nor do I truly think Landon is a demon child (at least I hope he's not). But yesterday in church a lady was giving a talk and was mentioning some of her 'mommy moments' that happened that week. One was that her 3 month old pooped all over her at the mall, and dripped all over the floor. Which sounded like a nightmare, but it reminded me of the time when Landon was a little baby. And we were in Old Navy with him (remember this Amanda?) Hannah picked him up out of his car seat and orange baby poop started dripping out of his pants. It filled his socks and was puddling on the floor. Amanda's motherly instincts kicked in as her hand shot out started catching the dripping poop. I grabbed him, took him into the dressing room and gave him a bath with wet wipes, while my mom worked on getting the floor cleaned up, and Amanda was cleaning off her hands. Anyway, with newborns experiences like this are unavoidable.

But this lady was also telling about another 'mommy moment' she had this week. She was working on her computer and when she came downstairs her two boys (5 and 4 or something like that) were taking their sippy cups and showering her living room with milk. As I was listening to this story I was thinking 'Yep, situations like that happen multiple times a day in my house' I'm starting to realize that not all 3 year olds and 20 month olds are as destructive as my kids are. Why is this? Am I doing something horribly wrong as a mom that is making my kids act like this? Or did I do something previously that I'm being punished for? Or is the Lord just testing me, to see how I'll work through this 'trial'? Or are all kids like this, and I'm just a wimp and don't handle it right? No matter what the reason the facts are this: RAISING KIDS IS HARD WORK!

For the sake of making this blog even longer, let me tell you about some of the fun things that have happened today. Like when my kids dumped an entire bottle of baby soap on the toy room carpet and kitchen floor. The more and more I tried to clean it out of the carpet, the more and more suds were being produced. Landon ripped open 2 loaves of bread and scattered them all through the kitchen, living room, up the stairs, and in my bedroom. He dumped all my dirty clothes out of the basket in my bedroom, tore all the blankets off of my bed and his bed (after I'd already made both beds) and then he threw a 30+ minute fit because I told him to clean it up. He refused to eat his lunch, but keeps whining that he's hungry (which he probably is, but I told him if he didn't eat his lunch then he wouldn't get any snacks). I need to take Steven's pants to the dry cleaners so they'll be done before his presentation for school on Wednesday. I haven't gone yet though because Tyler and Addie were napping, and I don't have my carseat for Tyler, plus it feels like -3 degrees outside with the wind chill. Plus I'm so worn out from trying to keep up with my kids, I don't have the energy or desire to go. But, I'm just going to go once Tyler is picked up.

Anyway, if you've stuck with this ranting blog, thanks for hanging in there. I've just been thinking a lot lately (mainly today) about kids and how much work they are. And I'm just thankful there are some upsides to having kids, which strongly out weight the downsides (usually). And I've come to the conclusion that this isn't probably a punishment as much as a blessing, and I just need to look at the situation differently. Being a mother truly is a blessing, with lots of lessons to learn, I just need to remember to think of it that way, and look at the bright side.