Motherhood Monday 1

"NO LANGUAGE CAN EXPRESS THE POWER, AND BEAUTY, AND HEROISM, AND MAJESTY OF A MOTHER'S LOVE." -Edwon Hubbell Chapin

I always knew I wanted to be a mother. Always. I remember being eight and loving my dolls like they were real. I remember the carriage I pushed them in. There were times I thought for a moment that I should be into things my friends were into at the time. But I really just loved being a mother to those dolls. I dreamed and wished and knew I would be a mama one day.

There were times in college when I thought how I wish these classes would be over so I could be a teacher in a classroom - so I could be married - and so finally I could be a mother.

I don't think I ever thought of motherhood with children past the age of three. After all, my dolls never grew up, they were babies forever.

And even though I never pictured a fifteen year old and an eleven year old I do love being a mother. That hasn't changed at all. I'm still just as passionate about it. Still just as in awe. Still wanting to do my best while my heart fills up with nothing else in this world - the way it fills with mothering.

I've decided to reflect on mothering and motherhood {for me} every Monday. Really, for me, to remind myself of things I believe, and maybe one day for my daughters to read as they search for inspiration, and faith, and meaning in motherhood.



So for today - my topic, my thought is on leaving my career, my teaching, leaving my classroom:

I left teaching for thirteen years. Thirteen glorious, wonderful, amazing, hard, growing, loving years. Of all of the things God has given me, of all of the gifts in my life that I know are from His hand - thirteen years has been the greatest surprise and most wonderful gift of all. Thank you Lord for those years. They are treasures that carry me through and give me strength, and they are from You.

When Anna came home, her little hand in mind, the smell of her head, just picking her up out of her crib filled my emotional cup like nothing I'd ever known. I do believe that God gives us such a richness in babies to carry us through the more challenging, more mundane everyday tasks of those early years. Rocking her in her nursery and reading to her was all I could ever want. I thanked God for each moment with that precious Chinese baby in my arms. Not one moment was taken for granted.

The "plan" was for me to stay home, out of the classroom for one full school year. But she was the most beautiful, most enduring, most lovely baby that ever existed on the planet and certainly in my wildest dreams.

I didn't exactly ever sit down at one time and think This is it; I'm choosing traditional motherhood over my own career, over my teaching. I simply wanted to be with my daughter as much as possible. I wanted to woo her, love her, care for her, and serve her and find joy in each moment she required. So when that call came in late March from my principal about me returning the next year, I simply said no.

And that decision led to thirteen years at home.

To my grown dear daughters who may read this one day:

If you can, if only you can, stay at home with your lovely babies and soak those years up; for as many as the Lord will give you. It's that simple. There are no other words to say.

Let God write on your hearts what you should do. And know that the daily, hard, repetitive work of making a home a haven, providing healthy meals, correcting your little ones, constantly cleaning up messes, is really the stuff from which Godliness is built. And it is important work.