A quiet house

A quiet house is a beautiful thing and I know I should be in bed, getting some much needed beauty sleep, but here I am, wide awake and enjoying doing whatever the heck I want to do. Right now, I am obviously blogging. The other night, I took advantage of the quiet to scrub my kitchen sink with bleach cleaner. Some nights I spend WAY too much time on Facebook and other nights I hopelessly search for ancestors and family trees on genealogy websites. I love this quiet. When no one is pawing at me, begging for a snack, tormenting their sister, asking to be read to, played with...well, you get the idea. I am so thankful for all of those things because all of those things may annoy me at times, but all I have to do is think back to the years I prayed to be a Mom. And here I am, a Mom, soaking in the silence.

I watched my four year old put diapers on some of her stuffed animals today, which, by the way, she is very good at. After a few minutes, I told her she was being a good Mommy and she told me, "It's hard work being a Mommy." Truer words have never been spoken. For all the joy that Motherhood brings, it brings enormous amounts of work that no human could ever finish. It brings guilt and self-doubt. Hurt and worry. And let's not even talk about stretch-marks and gray hairs! But, oh the joy is worth every worry line, every tear-stained pillow and callused knees from praying, once again, that God will give you the wisdom you need to just maybe, not screw 'em up. The joy of Olivia wrapping her arms around my neck to give me a big hug. The joy of Mia telling me how much she loves me. The joy I see in Sarah's eyes when she sees me and knows I am about to pick her up. The joy of just sitting with my girls in my lap, soaking up their warmth and scents, knowing that there will be a day all too soon when they no longer want to sit in Mommy's lap.

Here I am, a Mom, soaking up the silence suddenly wishing my girls weren't all sleeping soundly in their beds but instead, snuggled up with me talking too loud and irritating each other because Olivia's foot accidentally touched Mia's. Do you think I will remember this tomorrow when I am hoping for five minutes of quiet and threatening a time-out to the next person that even thinks about touching me?

Me either.