Life With School-Aged Kids

"...Whatever you do, do all to the glory of God." 

1 Corinthians 10:31

 

We're now more than halfway over with the school year and instead of winding down, things at our household are just beginning to wind up! There's the final EOG exams at the end of the month to prepare for. The end of school pool party to plan. My son's final Orchestra Festival. My other son's end of year class event. Then, of course, are the spring sports to sign up for. Soccer. Tennis. Swim classes. Yeah, the lazy days of winter are behind us and, just like I do every year, I wonder how the heck I'm going to make it through the next few months without hot-gluing a cup of coffee to my hand!

I'm currently reading a wonderful book called Ever After: Life Lessons Learned in my Castle of Chaos. It's written by a woman named Vicki Courtney, mother of three and current empty-nester. Her book is hilarious, but it's also chock full of great advice for us moms who are still "in the grind." I decided to include one of her chapters in this blog because a) it's funny as heck and b) it's such a reflection of what us busy moms are like.

Chapter 10: School Daze

I am convinced that teachers are engaged in a secret conspiracy to make all mothers certifiably crazy by summer break. I wouldn't be the least bit surprised if they get a finder's fee from the state mental hospitals as part of their bonus incentive package. Priority for admittance should be given first to homeroom mothers and PTA officers. I realize that some you may be a bit hesitant to believe my teacher conspiracy theory, which, of course, means that your children are not yet school-aged. The truth is, teachers begin this "survival of the fittest" experiment the first week of school. What else can explain the three dozen required forms (per child) that must be filled out by hand and submitted the following morning? And while we're on the subject of forms, is this really the best time for teachers to include a questionnaire to "better get to know your child" and ask for a detailed bio of their strengths and weaknesses? (Here's what I put in the weakness column: My child is adversely affected when his mother goes whack over all the paperwork she has to fill out the first night of school.)

And let's not forget that those required forms come home on the same day as the school supply list. Or make that lists (plural) if your child is older than grammar school and changes classes throughout the day.

If you didn't crack while filling out the mounds of paperwork, you most certainly will begin to fall apart when you attempt to track down the composite notebook with graphing lines. One year, I had to hit 3 office supply stores in my search for this elusive item, only to discover it was on the endangered species list of office supplies. I was on the verge of taking a stack of graph paper to the local Kiinko's and paying $24 to have them bound together when, alas, another mom hit the jackpot and picked up some extra notebooks for me. I thing she got them from a guy who operates the school supply black market from his garage on the bad side of town. His primary customer base, you may wonder? Crazed mothers, of course! The business has been so successful, he's about to start a line of franchises across the country.

Just when I thought I could kick up my heels and sink into my favorite easy chair in celebration of surviving Day One of back-to-school mayhem, in walks my youngest with an announcement that he has a "family shield" project due. The next day. AND he gets five extra bonus points if he brings in three extra boxes of tissues with the project. I might have had the tissues on hand, had I not used them up the day before while bawling my eyes out over trying to find graphing paper. Time to pu on a pot of coffee and get to work! After, of course, I made a late-night run to the local drugstore to get construction paper and markers, since I wiped out the emergency stockpile at home to fill the school supply lists the day before.

Unfortunately, my son forgot to mention the part about the family shields being on display in the hallway outside of his classroom on Back-To-School Night. I learned this detail the hard way when I arrived at my child's classroom and was greeted by a group of parents oohing and ahhing at the long line of children's projects on the wall. If I had known the projects were going to be displayed for every other parent to see, I would have called up our black-market buddy to see if he had a family shield project he could rent me for a few weeks!  My husband and I quickly spotted our son's project. It was sandwiched between two family shields that looked like they were on loan from the Metropolitan Museum of Art. One project was a hand-sewn family shield that doubled as a windsock to hang proudly over their front porch as a permanent reminder to the awesomeness of their kid...or mother...or whoever made the project. Another one was made out of actual scrap metal and mounted on a small piece of plywood. It looked like it weighed over a hundred pounds...Clearly, this child's mother was a welder with access to a front-loader. And then there was [my son's] project -- a montage of haphazardly cut pieces of construction paper mounted on a half sheet of poster board. Oh, the shame! His poor little project looked like something a first grader would turn in. Oh, but wait! He was a first grader!

I had to pull myself together before entering the classroom. I couldn't let on that I was cracking this early in the game....

The week of the school-wide Thanksgiving feast arrived, and I announced to my family that they were on their own, barring any emergencies. I further defined "emergencies" as blood and broken bones and made my way to the kitchen to report for duty...I'm happy to report that I made my assigned 2 dozen rolls from scratch and cooked up a batch of the homeroom mother's sweet cornbread dressing, as per the enclosed recipe, and I did it with a smile on my face....There was no time to fall apart. While the dressing was browning and the rolls were rising, I had to whip up a pilgrim costume for Hayden to wear to the feast, review 50 math drill cards with him before sunrise, and somehow manage to be nice to be husband and 2 older children in the process. Is it just me, or have you noticed that the teachers who often assign the projects that require sewing are the young ones who have yet to have any children of their own? Their biggest worry at the end of the day is feeding Mr. Jingles, the house cat, and remembering to pick up the dry cleaning by 5pm. Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do!

The pace is crazy enough for parents with one child, but for those of us who have two or more kids in school at the same time, may heaven help us! And I do mean that, literally. You will need heaven's help to survive. Take my advice: if you're still in the family planning stages, stagger your kids, oh, say, ten years apart to make these years a bit more manageable...

As I reflect back on those crazy, chaotic school years, I remember wondering if I was the only one who was struggling to keep up with the pace. I would run into other mothers who seemed so calm, cool and collected. Were they just better actresses when it came to hiding the nervous tic brought on by the school-daze frenzy? Was there stress in their marriage related to the pace? Were they crumbling behind closed doors in the privacy of their own homes?...

Yet, when I read through the Proverbs 31 passage, I see a similar chaotic pace in play. The virtuous woman was buying vineyards, sewing bed coverings, selling sashes to the merchant ships, and reaching out to the needy. And on top of that, she was doing her husband good and not harm, all the days of her life. All of them? Every single one? We get a glimpse into her attitude in verse 25: Strength and dignity are her clothing, and she laughs at the time to come. Aha! Maybe we're onto something here. She accepted the chaos that fell outside of her control with a calm attitude of "it is what it is." The truth is, you can't laugh at the time to come until you first learn to laugh at the day at hand. At the end of the day, we're all just doing the best job we possibly can to survive the whirlwind of school-daze activity...in order to lighten to load and make it a more manageable pace. More importantly, we need to cut ourselves some slack when it coems to the pressure we feel to measure up to an impossible standard to do everything and do it perfectly.

...We've all had our Martha moments. Distracted, worn out, tired, weary, always doing, doing, doing. But are we doing too much? If we are missing out on the one thing needed, we most certainly are....Too often, we bring more to the table than is necessary when it comes to helping our children prosper. Maybe we should aim for "enough" rather than "too much."

...I am grateful for what the Scripture DOES not say about being a parent. There is nothing in the Scripture about being a perfect parent. There is no 13th commandment about making sure your children's school projects look professionally tailored. There is no lower level of heaven reserved for parents whose children only make Cs. And praise God, he didn't base our salvation on whether or not our children win a ribbon at the science fair....

Time flies. Our lives are short. The things that matter so much to us in this moment, like the best Pilgrim costume ever seen on any child in the state of Texas, won't really matter 20 years from now. That project you're flipping out over? It'll be in the trash can by the end of the year. (Unless you decide to sell it on the black market!)...

If you're currently in the midst of the school daze, I want you to take a breath. And now, try to crack a smile. Even if it's forced. Breathe. Smile. Repeat. After a while, it will come more naturally. You're doing a great job. No one has it all down. We're all jsut taking it one day at a time, one pilgrim costume at at ime, one late-night-trip-to-the-craft-store at a time. Even those of us writing the parenting books. Take a pat on the back from this empty-nester who today is laughing her head off at the memory of it all. And wishes she had started laughing sooner in the game. This, too, shall pass. And in the meantime, give me a buzz if you need a...family shield or pilgrim costume. I might be able to hook you up!

Prince Charming

 

"...seek and you will find..."

Matthew 7:7

Ahh....love. It's a wonderful thing, no? Oh, I'm not talking about the fairy-tale, Cinderella-story kind of love. I'm talking about the kind that's real. (Oh, you thought fairy tales actually exist? Excuse me while I chuckle for a moment...) No, I'm talking about practical, every day kind of love. Everybody wants it. All you have to do is look down the list of movies they're giving at the theatre, or look up this week's line up on the Lifetime Movie Network channel. Take a walk through the humongous Romance section at Barnes & Nobles or your local library. Or just pick up the latest gossip magazine at the supermarket check-out area. Love -- the quest for it and the heart break of it -- seems to be on everyone's mind all the time.

Now, don't get me wrong. There's a lot of single ladies (and guys) out there who are single and loving it and I say "kudos" to you because that shows that you're emotionally healthy and grateful for all that your life does have. But for those of you who are struggling with this, well....you're not alone. (So keep reading.)

When you don't have love in your life, this over-emphasis can make you feel down in the dumps because all it does is make your loneliness that much more obvious (at least to you). Some people feel that emptiness way deep inside their souls. Not only do you not have a romantic love, maybe you don't have familial love, either, or the love that comes from true friendships. That emptiness is like a gaping, black hole in your life. You try not to think about it during your day-to-day, but every once in a while, it creeps up on you and taps you on the shoulder. Like the time you got that big promotion and you didn't have anyone to celebrate with. Or when you went on vacation...alone. Or maybe the loneliness slaps you in the face when you are once again, attending the wedding of yet another friend or family member and everyone around you notices your ring-less finger while shaking their head in sympathy and clucking their tongues, whispering about how your biological clock is just ticking away. Let me not even get started on how bad it can be for some people during the holidays!

This loneliness can be gut-wrenching. It can be depressing. It can even be dangerous. In their desperate attempt at "solving" their loneliness, women (and men) will sometimes reach out and latch on to anyone, whether they're good for them or not. They skip the dating part and go straight to the "dessert." They know the guy for a few months and quickly decide to get married before he changes his mind. They stay with a person who is emotionally and/or physically abusive. I mean, the list goes on and on....

There's absolutely nothing wrong with wanting to find your Prince Charming or your very own Cinderella. There's nothing wrong with wanting to settle down, have a few kids. If your loneliness stems from lack of other types of relationships, then I say to you that there's nothing wrong with yearning for friendships with others that are true and sincere and loyal (none of that back-stabbing business, please!) But here's the thing. Even if you found Prince Charming tomorrow, he isn't going to be enough to fill that aching need deep within your soul. He might compliment you, he might make you incredibly happy sometimes. He might even ease your loneliness. But he won't fill that little spot inside of you that yearns for that "something else." Because there's only one guy who can do that.

His name is Jesus.

Before you roll your eyes and tell me how corny I sound, think about it for a second. You've done it all. You have a successful career. Financially, you're well off. You have a great pad, a nice car. You've traveled the world and experienced fascinating new things -- surfing, rock climbing, gourmet cooking. You've picked up some pretty cool hobbies like pottery, gardening, ball-room dancing, painting. When you go out with your friends, you're laughing, joking around, having a grand ol' time. Everyone who sees you thinks: "Damn, that guy/girl has the perfect life."

But it's not so perfect, is it?

Because at the end of the day, when you leave the party, when you leave your job, when you come back from your trip, when you're one night stand slips out in the middle of the night -- the emptiness is still there.

We try all sorts of things to fill that hole in our lives. Some people even go as far as turning to drugs or alcohol. Food is another tool used to search for comfort. Others lose themselves in their work. Some think that sex, because it's such an intimate act, will do it for them. But the next day, your bed is cold and empty. The numbing high of drugs and alcohol will eventually wear off. And that piece of chocolate cake is only going to lead to another, and another, and another....

You can deny it all you want. You can turn off the computer right now and walk away. But you know it's true. You're searching for love --- for someone to accept you and care for you and protect you. But honey, you're looking in all the wrong places. All you need to do, is look up.

The apostle John put it very simply: God is love. Pure, undiluted, untainted, sacrificial kinda love. That kind of unblemished, soul-filling, gut-wrenching love can only come from Him. Not from a husband or wife. Not from a child or a best friend. Not from work or food or drugs or alcohol or whatever else you're using. You can keep on searching for things or people to fill that hole in your life, but nothing and no one is gonna fill it like Jesus can. Once you realize that and accept Him into your life, being alone will no longer be so unbearable to you because deep inside, even though you can't see Him, you know that He's with you. And knowing that is going to give you a sense of peace like you've never felt before.

Believe it or not, you were created to worship God. You were created, as His child, to have a relationship with Him. And until you recognize this, the tide of your loneliness will never recede. Jesus Himself says in John 6:35:

"I am the bread of life. He who comes to me shall never hunger

and he who believes in me, shall never thirst." 

He also says in John 8:12:

"I am the light of the world. He who follows me shall not walk in darkness,

but have the gift of life."

Now that's what I'm talking about! What a promise! He will take you out of the darkness and give you life. Life! (Close your eyes and just breathe the word in.) Everything that's beautiful about life He will give to you because that what He's all about: beauty, light, love, peace....

Not only will you be knocked over by His peace and His love, you'll also learn a lot about patience. Eventually, you'll find that special someone. Sometimes God withholds certain things from our lives because the timing isn't right (and when I mean timing, I'm not talking about your timing, I'm talking about His). Other times our hearts or our circumstances (aka: your life) requires a few adjustments or some tweaking before He can look down and say: "Okay, she's ready now."

Remember, God only wants the best for you. The very best. There's no such thing as second-best or hand-me-downs or leftovers when it comes to God. I'm a very firm believer in that there is someone out there for everyone. He might not come into your life when you want him to and you might have to wait a bit, but when love comes...oh, how wonderful will it be! Because you waited in God's time, He'll reward you with the very person He's been grooming all these years especially for you. And it will be absolutely lovely. It doesn't matter if you're 45 or 65...it's never too late for love.   

But in the meantime, why don't you make Jesus your Prince Charming. Because guess what? Unlike the characters that came from Walt Disney's imagination, He's not a fairytale.

His love is very, very real.