Oh boy, was I having a bad day. It was just 'one of those days', you know? Every blue moon they seem to happen, where nothing goes according to plan. On this particular day, instead of seeing it as a testing tool for my attitude, I let my attitude get the best of me and was on a tear. No one could say or do anything right. I snapped at anything that moved. Of course, none of my outbursts were justified, I was totally letting my emotions control me and everyone was bearing the brunt of it.
By 5 o'clock the kids were overjoyed to see their father come home. They all agreed that it would be in everyone's best interest to lock mommy in her room and give her a good hour of uninterrupted time to decompress and be alone. I had to agree. That was the best idea I'd heard of in a long time. It's always humbling to 'tell on yourself', but it is very necessary. Confession is good for the soul, right? Well, it definitely was for mine.
Chuck graciously occupied the children and cooked while I lounged on the bed and read for a good hour and a half. When I was summoned to the dinner table, to my surprise, I found many beautiful drawings. The boys colored and drew numerous pictures of spiderman and wonderwoman and rainbows for me. How could that simple act of love not change a person's heart. Thankfully, it softened my heart and my attitude. They showered love on me instead of complained and whined about what a 'bad mommy' I had been that day. True love is gracious.
As I was tucking the boys into bed, I apologized for the 100th time for my yucky attitude and asked what I could do to reassure them of my love for them. I really wanted them to know that I still loved them even though I was in a bad mood and had made them sad. Bennett didn't hesitate, he immediately told me that I could draw him 4 pictures and place them on his placemat at the table before breakfast the next morning. Gavin took a little longer to contemplate the ramifications before answering, "You can get me up really early in the morning and spend some alone time with just me and we could color." Those two requests did not ask alot of me, but they did require me to give from my heart. I was overjoyed to do these as my penance.
As it turned out, I woke Gavin up at 6:30am the next morning and we had a wonderful time coloring and talking, just the two of us, for a whole hour. When I went to get Bennett, I told him that he had some special pictures waiting for him downstairs on his placemat. You would have thought it was Christmas morning the way he ran down to look. Actually, everyone ended up getting a picture from Mommy. I figured if it worked to make me feel loved and special and wanted, it would work for the rest of my family too.
