Living on a Prayer

I overheard some interesting comments from my girls today while pushing my two youngers on the swings as Miss swung  by herself on the glider.

Lass (to Miss): “You’re doing that all by yourself. You can teach me how to swing by myself too.”

Miss: “Yeah. I’ll teach you. I’m a good teacher. I can be your mommy.”

Lass: “Yeah! You can be my mommy!”

Me: “Hey, wait. I’m your mommy.”

Lass: “No, no, no. I mean after you die.”

Oh. Well, that makes me feel better.

I have to admit though, I can’t blame them for fantasizing about another mommy a little bit. The past week or so I have been so tired and so crabby. I can’t even stand myself when I act like a jerk to my kids for much of the day, so I can understand if they might think an alternative would be enjoyable from time to time.

I’m sure that being tired in itself has contributed to my yucky attitude, but it’s a bit more than that too, I think.

Usually I wake up at 5:30 in the morning and spend some time praying and reading the Bible. It’s a wonderful way to get my mind and my heart right for the rest of the day. But lately I’ve been so tired, I haven’t wanted to get up early and I’ve been missing out on my usual prayer time. I’ve been trying to squeeze it in at other times, but that is never quite as fulfilling, and some days I’ve even missed it all together. This is not a good thing.

I was so disgusted with myself last night after a few days of just being a grouch, that I vowed to get up early and start my day right. So I did. I didn’t quite make it out of bed at 5:30, but I was downstairs saying my prayers by a few minutes after 6. And it made all the difference. I got some good Jesus time to start my day, and then I had an awesome day with my kids. 

An amazing thing I’ve learned in the past year and a half is that when I feel like a crappy mom, when I’m grumpy and acting like a jerk, when I’m impatient and snappish, I now have an incredible solution. I used to beat myself up and flounder through my difficulties and eventually give myself a pep talk and feel better. Now I know that I can just turn to prayer and pretty quickly get myself back on track. Seriously, it works.

When I’m drowning and feeling like I can’t do anything right, I turn my face to God and say, “Help me!” And He does.

When I’m having a wonderful day and feel like I’m Super Mom and all is going just right, I turn my face to God and say, “Thank you!”

Today, I said, “Thank you!”