Have ever had a day where you messed up over and over again? I mean, you just couldn’t seem to get your groove on.
We had a day like this yesterday.
Tatum was up earlier than usual, and instead of letting her sleep a bit longer, I went in and got her up.
We spent the first 30 minutes of the morning in the Word. I read our devotion, then I grabbed my Bible as Tot played. She noticed that I was reading, so she grabbed her Bible and we sat together; Tatum and me…enjoying Jesus. Pretty darn cool.
This start of the day thrilled me, and I knew it was going to be an incredible day!
Or was it?
Around 9:30, Tatum decided to do the exact opposite to what I said more than once. Hmmmm. My voice raised a few octaves and I felt myself reverting to a broken record of “Don’t do this..Don’t touch that…” Yuk. Obviously, this was not effective, and I know better, yet, I was flustered and she could tell. In the past, redirection or positive talk like, “Not for Tatum, but this Tatum can play with” worked. (And it still does) But, again, we just were not jiving, Tot and me, not communicating well at all. Whose fault was this? Mine, yet I let it influence my attitude.
She had to pull a few more hiccup moments that day, and I had to raise my voice a few octaves higher, but in the end, at the end of the day…..
We made Lemonade. (virtually that is)
Those darn lemons can be so sour. The aftertaste can last and last, unless you wash it down with some grace and some love. HOW?
Well, first, before bed last night, we prayed together, and we talked about the day. We do get angry..both of us. But we need to work on handling it better (me too!) She has every right to try to exert herself and challenge boundaries, but she also has the duty to be obedient. It’s a learning curve for me in how I handle the moments that she does challenge those set lines and rules.
Making lemonade with Tatum is what we do everyday. Messing up and trying again is all part of parenting and all part of being a kid. It’s all part of being HUMAN! The grace given to us by our Father who showed us HOW is the model I choose to follow. Tatum can learn to see that Jesus is her role model in what obedience looks like (i.e. we show love by obeying the ones we love!), but more importantly what LOVE really means.