Making the decision to have a child is momentous. It is to decide forever to have your heart go walking around outside your body. ~Elizabeth Stone
Isn't it true, the saying, "Out of the mouth of babes!"? Well I've four babes, albeit growing-like-weed babes, but nonetheless. And if I wrote about EVERY hysterically funny, often emberassing, reality jolting comments my kids made I'd be at my desk all day writing. Oftentimes I don't see that that would be too bad of a thing as my kids have quite the wisdom to bestow upon the world, oh yes they do. lol.
So Sunday night we're lounging around watching t.v. They were all in their p.j.'s and suppose to be in bed but I let them stay up to watch "Deal or No Deal". I'm sitting in the rocking chair with Dion falling asleep on my lap and a Wells Fargo Bank Commercial comes on. You know, the ones with the old fashion horse and wagon running around wildly. The commercial ends and the silence is broken by Lacey Mae, who is now 8 going on 14. She says, "Mom, when you were little like me were there cars yet? Or did you just have horses and buggies? You know, Mom, back in the nineteen hundreds." I sat there for a second, thoroughly confused... I mean up until this point I was always so proud of how brilliant Lacey was. She did everything early. Walked at 8 months. Potty trained at a year old. Was the first one in her class to read. Pretty much has half the Bible memorized. But she wants to know if I was alive THAT LONG AGO!!??! Thanks Lace. As if I already didn't feel old enough. lol. I said, in a full-blown effort not to be condenscending, "Uhm, no, Sweetie. There were cars.". "Oh, ok. I was just wondering." she says. lol.
Perception is an amazing thing when you look through the eyes of children. And actually it becomes an amazing thing when you look through the eyes of anyone else but your own.
Lacey quickly redeemed herself. As she was brushing her teeth a bit later, her little brain OBVIOUSLY at work there at the bathroom sink, she sticks her head out of the bathroom door and into the hallway. I was standing at the kitchen counter. "Mom," she says. I turned around. "Yeah?" I asked, bracing myself for the next BRILLIANT question from my eldest daughter. "Since you know everything, do you know what it is called when you have four babies. I know two is twins. Three is triplets. But what's four?" Ahhhhhh. I breathed a sigh of relief. "Yes, Lacey, I do know.... since I know EVERYTHING. They are called quintuplets. Now finish your teeth and NEVER forget that I know EVERYTHING!! God gives me ALLLL the answers so that I can be the best mom to you. So you should always ask me if you have a question and if I think you need to know I'll tell you and you have to listen to me because I'm your mom and I know EVERYTHING. Remember that." Nearly breaking my arm to pat myself on the back for the quickness and astoundingly brilliant response I managed to come up with, I turned around before she could see me grin. And what do I hear her muffle under her voice as she turns to go back to the sink?? "Suuuuure you do, Mom. Whatever you say. It's YOUR story." Whaaaaaaaaaaat??? Oh no she just didn't!!!!
But yes, she very much so did. And when I paused for a second to fully appreciate the moment, you know - the moment in which you remember CLEARLY telling them the exact same thing some time previously, the moment when you hear your voice coming through their mouths... and I realized, again, as I often do, what a honour and privilege and HUGE RESPONSIBILITY raising these gifts from God is. That it is my hands, my words, my attitude that is molding and shaping these little, short, thieves of patience that I've running around here. And they make me want to try harder. They make me want to make better choices. They make me want to be a better person, a better mother, a better friend.
So, the point of this story is, if any of you are in need of some motivation I rent them out, dirt cheap, catch me on a good day and I'll pay you if you'll borrow them!!!! lol. I jest. I think my point is clear...
