Why You Should Quit Parenting!

For the majority of her life, she has been completely complete watching her siblings bathe in the lime light. She has watched Katie perform in dance after dance, play after play, skit after skit. She's watched Lucy melt an entire auditorium like putty in her hands, and Anderson's birth order and stand alone maleness, always catches somebody's eye. She has cheered each of them on, sat on the edge of her sit shaking on their behalf, and jumping to her feet in applause for them. Julia has always preferred the behind the scenes work.

Last fall, Julia's second grade teacher assigned the entire class to give a memorized oral book report, to be given in front of an audience in the school auditorium. Horrified, doesn't begin to express how she was feeling, "Why?! Why?! Why?! Would a teacher make me do such a thing? This is not fair!" After weeks of her teachers patiently working with each child in the class, and her rehearsing every night with me and Mark on articulating her thoughts, the big day arrived and she.... FREAKED OUT! I pulled out every bribe in the parent handbook. Candy? SURE! Ice Cream? Uh, YEAH! No chores? ABSOLUTELY! Just get through the presentation.  We knew she was definitely ready, but we had not convinced her of that yet.

That day, for the first time in her life (with a few dance performances as the exception) SHE was being watched by our entire family. Her little hands were shaking and she had to intentionally get control of her rattling voice, but once she settled down the most amazing thing took place, her confidence began to override the nerves and she blossomed. She smiled that million dollar smile and right then and there, I melted.

A few short months later, she announced she was trying out for the school talent show, her talent? Singing. "Well, okay. Here we go!"  She rehearsed, she rehearsed and she rehearsed some more, and then the big day arrived and she FREAKED OUT! Back to the bribe book, "No, you never have to do the talent show again, but because you have made a commitment to sing tonight, you will follow through on your commitment. We want you to be a woman of your word! Other people have worked extremely hard to make tonight happen and we will honor their hard work by showing up and following through!"

She showed up, she sang, and YEP.... I melted.

For the last eleven years, I count it my greatest job to find my children. While I instinctively love them with every fiber in my body, it has taken focused time and effort to KNOW them.  It is one of the main reasons I love homeschooling. It has given me an opportunity to figure how each of my children learn. It is a focused time of collecting data on their souls. Katie is an auditory learner, Julia is a kinesthetic learner, Lucy is a visual learner, and Anderson is an aural learner. Utterly fascinating and COMPLETELY helpful when they start brick and mortar school.

I feel like when I am available to learn about the different idiosyncrasies planted in each of my children, I am in a better place to love them and know them.

This last year in particular, I have struggled with the absolute pit of a room Julia lives in. It blows my mind how "undone" and jiblet infested it can become in a matter of minutes. And it appears as if she doesn't even see the mess, but only sees all the "creations". I literally had to call on all the "creatives" in my life as a support group. "Please explain to me what her brain is doing and seeing a midst this tornado!" While none of them "excused" her mess, they helped me understand what her brain was doing. It was extremely helpful and therapeutic to realize one day she WOULD in fact keep a
clean-ish space, but to keep channeling that creative mind. Julia sees projects, creations, and art every where she goes. For instance, we semi-camped out over Labor Day, and Julia threw a plastic cup into the fire (cover your ears EPA spies-lalalalalala) as she saw it melting she hollered for Mark to pull it out of the fire. They pulled it out, ran it under cold water and VOILA! A new, red, solo cup creation!

Julia struggles with phonics and spelling (just like her Mama)... So this week in preparation of the spelling test, we are painting our words. We tried going over them verbally (which I should have known was a mistake, and we bombed the last test) So, we are approaching it differently.

Yesterday, feeling very saintly, I cleaned up Julia's room and stood in awe of all the amazing creations her little room was exploding with. Old ornaments made into necklaces, name tags made with ripped up old material, glue and cookie sprinkles. Shorts that were decorated with blue ties in support of her panthers, white piece of paper after white piece of paper covered in crayon, marker, and paint. Instead of huffing and puffing like I have in the past, I just tried to soak in her art and appreciate her gifting. I am not bent towards "crafting" I'd rather write a 12 page paper about crafting than actually craft :)

Julia likes to craft and create!

Katie is going to run the world.
Julia is going to decorate the world.
Lucy is going to entertain the world.
Anderson is going to conquer the world.

Saturday night, I was tucking Bean (Julia) into bed when she announced, "Oh yeah Mom, tomorrow at church, I'm going to get up during the service and be interviewed about Pioneer Girls!" My insides dropped, envisioning the scene to take place the next morning, Sunday morning OF ALL MORNINGS! I thought about what I had packed away that I could potentially bribe her with to get her up on the stage. "Ok, love, you'll totally rock it!"

Sunday morning came and she didn't make a peep about the impending event. I was praying she was having short term memory loss :) We sat down and the service began. A few minutes later it was her turn. She jumped up, walked straight down the church aisle without hesitation, answered each question with articulate, clear and confident answers (and lots of "yes ma'ams".... phew not voted off the island yet :) and smiled that million dollar smile for all to see. Not a single melt down involved.

In the middle of the interview, I glanced down the pew.  Katie, Lucy and Anderson were sitting on the edge of the pew, every ounce of them engaged with what Julia was saying, smiling nervous smiles bigger than I've ever seen them smile, and they jumped all over Julia with applause at the end of the service (five minutes later in the church parking lot they were fighting again. REAL.LIFE! :)

Julia was far from working behind the scenes on Sunday.

My eyes got all teary as I thought about all the blossoming our Jules has done over this last year. There is NO DOUBT in my mind that her confidence, and her ability to articulate her thoughts, have come from the unending encouragement and example her teacher instilled in her this last school year. We are so grateful!!

Parenting is hardest, most long suffering, most everyday, most dig-deep and grunt out the details kind of work. Yesterday, I retired. Today, I reenlisted for this CRAZINESS.  Getting to be apart of the dailiness in my children's lives will fill the museum of my mind and heart for remainder of my days. It's not easy AT ALL, it's not always fun and rosy (especially as we transition into hormone invested waters) but I just weep when I think about my babies. Their specific gifting, their bents, their strengths, their weaknesses, their learning styles, and how God saw fit for Mark and I to be able to taste them, research them, love them, guide them, and ultimately KNOW THEM for a life time!

Don't give up parents!
Don't quit!
We only get to raise them ONCE!
We only get to absorb them for a short amount of time before the dailiness is over.
Whether you have a world runner, world decorator, world entertaining, or world conqueror, press in to your children. Lean into them and uncover the amazing treasures that lie within.
It's so unbelievably worth it!
~Sara