Every morning, I say a prayer before I get up. The prayer varies, but I always pray for patience with my kids, especially on school mornings. I pray that I'll be able to be patient with my kids and start the morning off well.
And then the children wake up.
Or rather, I coax and cajole them out of bed for 15 minutes. Then they take 15 minutes to get ready. They fight with each other, yell at each other, refuse to eat breakfast, forget things upstairs that they need to take to school, and complain when I tell them they actually need to wear coats because it's frigid outside.
Some days, like today, I don't have patience. I yell for them to hurry up, eat faster, leave the twins alone, and just stop fighting!
But some days, I actually do have some patience. I take deep breaths when H tortures A2 about a toy or S and T get into another argument about something that's absolutely not important. I'm able to read morning scriptures without raising my voice because family members are actually within listening distance, rather than spread throughout the house.
Today was not one of those days, but I still pray every morning. For patience. For all of us.
Thursday, January 12, 2012
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4 comments:
I read somewhere about the idea of opening a prayer in the morning when we wake up and closing it when we go to bed at night--that everything during the day is just a verse in the same prayer. I think, for me it takes all that praying to come out with sometimes patience for having my face chewed off because someone was tired in the morning, or to ignore the temper tantrum because natural consequences have set in and someone doesn't like them. And on and on. Because really, most of my prayers are a variation on the same one you wrote. Help us all, oh please help us all!
I pray for the same:) Being a mom is hard work, definitely something that requires patience. Between all of the hard work it takes with raising just one child I try to enjoy every minute, even the break downs (like yesterday!) Because I know my little spit fire will no longer be little one day. I often think that "it's just me" that I'm the only mom who feels overwhelmed and stressed, but I think in reality, most of us feel that way at least some of the time.
So here's to all us moms, here's to doing our best:) And I know, Tennille, you are doing a great job;)
Our mornings have been ridiculous lately. I have tried putting the kids to bed earlier. Basically told them if the morning doesn't go well, then they have to go to bed that much earlier. More sleep helps. Getting them up earlier helps at our house because then we aren't so rushed but some days....some days it is just not good.
I need to pray more.
So here the kids' school starts at 7:45 am, and they need to leave the house about 7:35ish. We like to read scriptures before school so we target to do that at about 7:25 am. Because its so early, and I want the kids to get as much sleep as they can, we don't wake them up until 7 am (unless they wake up on their own which they often do). They have to get dressed, eat breakfast, Keegan feeds the dogs, have their teeth brushed and have everything downstairs like shoes and backpacks and coats by 7:25 so we can read. If they don't, they owe Bryan "time" (5 minutes for every minute they are late) after school. This could be standing in the corner, going to their room, doing a hated chore, whatever.
It has helped - Bryan came up with out of the blue one morning - but they really pay attention to the clock. I guess it doesn't help with the arguing per se, but I make sure that my kids don't do the same things at the same time. So if one is brushing their teeth I make sure the other one is doing something else. Of course, I only have two to coordinate so that's a big difference. But good luck! You're a great mom - proved by the fact that you pray every day to be better :).
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