Red X Part II

Sarah says:

I mentioned here that I liked the taste of this wine.  Well, I've had a change of heart... tonight this glass is awful.  My new recommendation would be to only drink this wine if you plan on consuming the entire bottle, because after day 1 it's no longer good.  Ew.. I feel like it's giving me a headache, and I've only had a few sips.

Speaking of X's - I give myself one big parent fail for last weekend.  Even after all the snuggles and extra special time that was had just the weekend before, I found myself failing as a Mom just the next weekend.  It's so easy to react when tragedy strikes, but even easier to fall back into our simple routine just days later. 

It was the Saturday before Christmas, I generally get all my preparations done early, so I was good to go, but was avoiding leaving the house because I knew anywhere we went would be madness.  Jon was working, so it was just me and the munchkins.  We sat around, I let them watch TV, I stalked around on the internet, I let them run around outside, but I found myself saying the words "I'm bored" over and over again.  GASP!  Mom's are not allowed to be bored, we don't have time to be bored, we have bigger more important things to do, boredom isn't allowed.  Yet, I was, in fact, bored.  It was my sweet Mary that snapped me out of it.  The words that came out of her mouth were as follows:  Mom, play with me.  It wasn't a question or a request, it was a statement... as in... YOU WILL BE PLAYING WITH ME NOW.

What's wrong with me?!  I was so caught up the previous week in being busy, that when I was finally done being busy, I forgot what it was my real job in life is... to play with my kids!  So playing we did.  Of course, by this time, it was 4:00 so the day was mostly over, so I tried my best to make it up to them.  We pulled all the train stuff out of Liam's room and set it all up in the living room.  We made the biggest track our new home has ever seen, there wasn't a single piece of track that wasn't utilized.  The kids... they loved it.  I wouldn't say it was my most favorite activity, but I certainly wasn't bored.  

Why is it so easy to forget to be grateful for what we have?  The whole time I was bored, I kept trying to think of something amazing to do, when really, the most amazing thing to my kids was right there in front of them.  When do we reach the age where we are no longer fascinated with the simple things, such as setting up trains with Mom, and instead need more and more entertainment?  And, even worse, when are my kids going to stop wanting to play with me?  

I haven't officially declared my New Year's resolutions yet, but I'm going to try to get something worked into them about spending more quality time with the kids, or living in the moment more.... something like that.

I'm thankful for my kids, who usually get me out of a down state pretty quickly.  What do you do to appreciate life?