Matt & I had been out of town all week so the only time we had to carve pumpkins was this afternoon. Trying to be the good devoted mother I dragged out all the pumpkin carving gear, cleaned off the pumpkins that have been sitting on our porch for a month and proceeded to dig in. Matt was home but working and I was letting the kids have some wind down time after school. I figured that it might be nice to go ahead and do all the scraping and disemboweling of the pumpkins for everyone so that when it came time to carve, hopefully the process would be relatively quick. Besides it was probably 3:00 by now and I knew trick or treaters would be coming soon. We had to get these pumpkins carved fast! They were, I swear, the THICKEST pumpkins I have ever carved by the way.
Anyway, I got the pumpkins all gutted and we proceeded to carve away. I carved Cooper's first because it was the smallest one and he has the shortest attention span, Matt came and did his, and Adriene and I spent the most time on ours. While I was working on mine I had Cooper dig into the box of Halloween goodies and asked him to put out these small metal and porcelain Jack-o-lanterns that we have. I thought it would be a good activity to keep him busy for a while while Adriene and I were finishing up the pumpkin carving. He did that project pretty quickly and found some fun stuff in the box. Things like light up necklaces, plastic spider, and other random toys. He was having a fun time swinging them around and and making up games to play with them in the living room. He was constantly saying, "Hey mom! Look at this! Hey mom! Come play this game with me... Hey mom... hey mom..." You get the picture. I give you 1 second to guess what my reply was--every time. "I'm busy... can't do it right now... wait until I'm done please..." You all know the drill.
We need a new paragraph for this...
So while Cooper's clamoring for my attention over and over, and I'm running out of time to get pumpkin's carved (it's after 4:00 now and people in Utah are usually at the door by 5:00), Adriene casually says to me, "You know mom, if you were a really REALLY good mom you'd stop carving your pumpkin for a few minutes and go play with Cooper then come back and finish later." EXCUSE ME! Ummm. What was all that f----ing work I just did to carve the thickest stupid a-- pumpkins in the world-- right after I got back from vacation, have no food in the house, have laundry to do, need to get ready for trick or treaters, and have... oh... I don't know... like a MILLION other things to do? Of course I didn't say any of those things to Adriene. But I was sure thinking it. Boy am I glad that people can't really read minds.
Anyway, I did call her on it. I did the classic mother guilt trip. "You don't think I'm a good mother?" She started back peddling and trying to talk her way out of it... all the while digging herself in deeper and deeper. Those of you who know me well will appreciate that I TOTALLY saw myself coming through in her at that moment. That is my signature move! She started with "of course you're a good mom, but you could be better, if... I mean you couldn't... well, you are really good [mom interjection...not really REALLY good?]... well yes, you are really really good but..." It was classic!
Our kids really do teach us a lot about ourselves, don't they? Patience, perseverance, dedication, appreciation... and the list never ends. I just have to remind myself in those moments that no one can be perfect and sometimes good enough just has to be enough. What is perfect anyway?
...besides, now I've got leverage with Adriene the next time she's having a 'tude about my parenting decisions.
5 comments:
MEL: You are a great mom; dedicated and loving to your kids...anybody can see that! A bad mom would have come home and taken some "ME" time after a long trip instead of trying to make memories with her little ones.
Ohhh... I just have to LAUGH!!! It starts early, doesn't it? My kids sometimes say stuff like that to me, and I'm thinking, either you have to just scream, or you write it down and laugh about it later. Seriously, Mel, if I haven't ever told you before, I really think you are a great mom. It amazes me all you get done, and you have a job too!!
CLASSIC!!! Love it. Sounds like something Grace would pull on me for sure. You know I was just giong to tell you you would be a better friend if you would take me on your next beach getaway...(are you feeling guilty yet....are you are you?) ;)
I think we hear it more often and push them off to do what we think is more important. And until someone else points it out, thank you children, we don't realize it. Kiss her and tell her thank you. The memory for both of you will last forever!
That is funny. Glad we have them around to teach us and remind us to have fun!
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