Sometimes I feel like..

I am not doing the best I could at being a mother, especially when I am yelling at my girls to get out the door in the morning so they don't miss the bus. Often I tell myself and I pray that I can muster up as much patience as possible in the morning, so that it doesn't go down the same way day after day. Actually in truth it is more like every other day, when Karsyn has Kindergarten. We use to think Kaydree was slow at getting ready, but Karsyn is even slower. She often gets distracted which I know is typical for her age, but sometimes it gets so frustrating. So the other morning, Karsyn hadn't put her school stuff where it belonged and it was spread all over the house. Some of it was out in the car, some of it was downstairs and some of it was upstairs. I could almost here my own mother saying, "You should have it all ready, the night before!" I don't know how she manages to do this? When this happens she walks around looking into space as she pretends to be looking for it. I could feel that frustration beginning to break, so I sent Kaydree out to get her coat from the car while I was feeding Kyce. Then Karsyn started crying. She didn't want to wear a cold coat, so I told her to wear her old black one, so she cried even harder as she informed me that she doesn't like her old coat. At this point she says, "I hate going to school. I hate having to get ready in the morning." What could I say? I don't like the mornings like this either. So the lack of me checking the night before has led to this little girl in tears. I do think that she can claim some of the responsibility, however I don't know at the age of 5 how fair it is to put the entire blame on her.
I use to call Benjy after the girls got on the bus after a stressful morning, but since Kyce has joined our family, it seems like every morning is somewhat crazy, so I stopped venting to him. So now he occasionally asks, "How were the girls for you this morning." He happened to come home for lunch after this horrendous morning and he asked me how it went. I informed him that Karsyn was disorganized and in tears. He responded, "Oh, no, she can't leave for school crying. That just breaks my heart. When she gets home, give her a big hug from me and tell her I can't wait to see her." Of course this made me have a reality check of instead of being frustrated it immediately made me feel guilty for not being as sympathetic and loving as I should have been. So again, I vowed to hug that little peanut super tight when she got home. When they got home, Kyce was eating so I called her over and hugged her and she told me all about her day. As I started to get dinner ready, Kaydree asked if she could hold Kyce, which comes in handy at this time of day. She took him and as I went to call them for dinner...this is what I found.

Oh...the tender mercies of our Heavenly Father. It was as if the entire stress of the morning had completely melted away and I was left with these three perfect little angels! It brought tears to my eyes and made me realize I have to do better and be better for these beautiful and impressionable little spirits!

I had just finished, "The Lovely Bones," so I had plans to go see the movie that night. As I jumped into the shower, Karsyn knocked on the door, which is another one of my frustration buttons, that I can't even be in the bathroom without someone needing to get in, even though we have another bathroom? So vowing to have patience I tell her that she can come in and get what she needed. When I got out of the shower there was a message from Karsyn on the mirror.

Again, another button...I just cleaned that mirror and now there are streaks... and yet all I could think of was how undeserving I am to have the unconditional love of my children! It was a very humbling day for me..