I was up at 6:30 on Sunday morning, with the monkeys standing by my side of the bed, talk-whispering one request after another.
“Mom, I need you to put the batteries in my new remote control car!”
“Mom, I need you to get the milk from the top shelf!”
“Mom, I need you to find my church shirt!”
“Mom, I need you to help me open this pack of markers!”
“Mom, I need you to…” do half a million other things as I stumbled down the stairs.
Much of this I was able to remind them that they are perfectly capable of doing for themselves.
As, for the other things, I had one request…
…let me have a little breakfast first.
Some mornings I can get up and get going and it’s no problem.
Some mornings, though, my diabetes reminds me that it is ever present and I really need something to balance out my blood sugar before I can even think coherently.
So, on Sunday morning, I just needed them to have something that we try, try, try to teach our children.
Patience.
And, so I ate my breakfast, but I did so with 3 little bodies hovering, ever near, daring to say things like “Are you done yet? Can you do it now? You could probably do it while you eat!” and Tiny looking at me from the high chair, eyeing up my eggs, thinking, “I should probably eat those, Mama. You look a little busy.”
The entire time I ate my breakfast, I was thinking about an article that my friend from high school, Meredith, posted on Facebook last Monday. It was about why French parents are superior, and while I don’t think we, as parents, need anything else to make us feel like we are doing a bad job, since we are our own worst critics, the article was really thought-provoking for me.
(You can read the article here.)
So, this week is going to be an effort in practicing being a French mere, and hopefully, helping my kids train to be a little more like French enfants.
I’ll let you know how it goes.
