easy on the ears…

“I have to yell because if I don’t yell nobody listens to me!”

 

I know, I know – I was NEVER going to say this stuff to my kids, but alas I have become that mother I swore I never would be. The irony is that as I got out of bed today I actually was praying that the morning routine would go well and I would not have to run around like a crazy woman. The prayer was prompted because that’s exactly the method used to get them into bed last night.

 

Tim is traveling for work and it is at these times that I realize just how important he is for the evening routine. I am such a morning person that by 7pm I am on auto pilot and nothing else of much good is going to get done. So last night when soccer was rained out and I realized that I didn’t have to take the entire tribe to practice by myself I was both relieved and worried. Sure we could all put on our pjs and catch up on the book reports and other homework that is due each week, but these kids were going to be hungry and I had promised McDonalds at the soccer field.

 

We did get take out and as they finished their homework and found “Dancing with the Stars” on TV I made them promise that they would go to bed immediately when I said it was time. Of course that’s not exactly how it went and by the time Tim called to check in I was fried.

 

Yes, but today was going to be a new day – a chance to make it all better and I was going to be filled with positive energy and the ability to charm them into a perfect morning. Now, all I can remember is what Cole was telling us he learned at church last week in the Children’s Homily. The priest said that when you pray to improve yourself in someway, God gives you lots of opportunities to get better at it. When I told him that I pray all the time that I don’t yell so much he answered, “Yup the priest is right you sure are getting lots of chances to work on that Mom.” And then he added, “Pretty soon you start getting good at not yelling, because it’s a lot for us to listen to while you practice.”