You know what’s really trying, as a parent? Trying to get anything done. Ever.
We’ve been trying to renovate/update our home for the past handful of years, and we’re still inching along, slowly making progress. It drives me absolutely crazy. Half-finished projects make me feel so unproductive and unmotivated, that I find myself only wanting to throw my hands up in the air, because, if we can’t finish this, then why do that?
When my boys get impatient (i.e. every opportunity they can seize), we sing a song called Have Patience. My husband taught us (which, I really have no idea where it came from), and I sing it almost every day. Most of the time my kids hate it (i.e. I sing it even louder) or they giggle and sing with me.
Here’s my message to myself, my pep talk:
The flooring can wait; your son’s need for your loving arms cannot. The walls can wait; your husband’s undivided attention cannot. The new light fixtures can wait; these moments of chasing after so many boys will be gone far too soon. The updated bathroom can wait; watching your sons bathe together in a tub will become a thing of the past in only a few short years. The smallness of this house can wait; you’ll never be this close again, literally and figuratively.
Have patience.
I want it all done, I want it all to be perfect and spotless and everything that reminds me of HGTV. But I will never get all the chaos of my sons and our life back once it’s gone. There will never be a time like this again, where I am constantly losing my mind and pulling my hair out. There will, however, be a moment when I look back and think, “I only wish I could go back just one more time.” (And I highly, highly doubt I’ll be thinking, MAN, really wish that house would’ve been finished faster so I would’ve missed all the good stuff.)
It’s good now. Not when things are “better”.
It just doesn’t get better than this.
JANELLE DELAGRANGE 