There is something about fall that makes me feel, well, more domesticated. Less like a dog, more like Betty Crocker or June Cleaver. I want to throw some flour and sugar into a bowl with an egg or two, slide it into the oven for 45 minutes and pull out a chocolate lava cake. (Isn't that how it worked on "Leave It To Beaver", or was it "Bewitched"?) I want my children at my side stirring in a bowl, learning about the ins and out of the kitchen, with everything perfectly clean and tidy, no one fighting, smiles on every face. (This is MY fantasy. It can be as unrealistic as I want it to be.) I want to spend an early afternoon at the park, feeding the ducks and playing on the swings, my camera snapping gorgeous shots worthy to be framed.
I know that one day (all too soon) my kids will have grown up and moved out. They will have their own adventures in life, creating their own stories with their own kids. I don't want to have lived every single day doing the same things- dishes, laundry, scrubbing toilets and floors, planning to go to the park tomorrow and never getting there. I don't want to wake up one morning, pack a lunch for us, grab my camera, hop in the car to realize I am the only one around. I don't want to have to eat the chocolate lava cake by myself. Okay- maybe I do! But, I don't want to make it by myself.
Just like I have every other Tuesday set aside for "library day", I could easily set aside every other Friday for "memory day". I
I have been handed such an amazing gift on a silver platter. I am blessed with four absolutely beautiful, smart, funny, caring kids. I have the privilege of not only staying home to care for them day to day, but I am their teacher! I can lace our days learning ABC's and 123's with learning of the great love, mercy, and grace of our heavenly Father. I have such a golden opportunity to be a memory maker with them, to build a bond that cannot be challenged. I must be very careful to treat this gift with the respect and reverence it deserves. I must not waste it away on things that will simply not matter one day.
"Children are a gift from the Lord; they are a reward from him." Psalm 127:3
"So I concluded that there is nothing better for people than to be happy and to enjoy themselves as long as they can. And people should eat and drink and enjoy the fruits of their labor, for these are gifts from God." Ecclesiastes 3:12-13
No comments:
Post a Comment