"Do you even know how to run?"
Last night at dinner, our children were angling to get the night to include their favorite noisy fun: Monster Tag.
Just to explain, Monster Tag is a game my husband made up that combines tag, hide and seek, and scaring people -- plus lots of running and screaming. The girls LOVE Monster Tag and their favorite place to play it is in the church where my husband pastors. There are lots of places for the "monster" to hide as they wait to jump out and tag their "prey". The wide open spaces of the church building provide a perfect place to run with wild abandon while screaming at the top of your lungs. It's a perfect place to run off energy, especially on rainy or cold days.
What our children don't realize is that Monster Tag is the game my husband usually plays with them when he's giving me some much needed quiet time. He takes the girls to the church while I stay at home to read or nap.
At last night's dinner table the girls throwing around lots of "please" and "pretty please" in their effort to convince us to head to the church for a game. My husband was taking the lead, since Monster Tag is his thing and since he knew I needed a break from the never-ending-sister-bickering-Christmas-Break-madness.
My children don't know about my need for quiet time and breaks from the chaos. They think that I should be having loads of screaming fun playing Monster Tag, too. In the conversation, my ten year old asked why I don't play Monster Tag. And then she innocently asked "You do know how to run, don't you?"
Ouch.
I felt horrible and embarrassed at what my children might secretly think of me. Do they really secretly believe I CAN'T run? We go on walks and bike rides and hikes together….but I rarely ever run. I don't run unless I have to because it usually ends in an painful reminder of that time I fell off the ladder and jacked my knee up. While I reeled inside, my husband gracefully turned the joke around and then changed the subject away from Monster Tag.
The conversation left me feeling very inadequate as a mother. Why DON'T I play rough-and-tumble games with my children? Why DON'T I chase them and make them scream/giggle with delight? Why DON'T I go sledding with them in winter or down the water slides with them in summer? Why DON'T I play catch with them? Worst of all -- does that mean all their happiest childhood memories will be of my husband and not me?
And then -- maybe by the Holy Spirit -- I was reminded of my own mother. She didn't play Monster Tag with us or make us scream/giggle with delight or ride bikes or sled or go down watersides. And, yet, I don't remember ever being concerned about those things because those were the things we did with my dad. Those were my happy "DAD-MEMORIES".
The great thing about my childhood is that I have loads and loads of happy "MOM-MEMORIES", too. My mom was a stay-at-home mom who took us on all sorts of adventures during the summer or breaks from school. Each week during the summer we went to a different library in our county where we would listen to stories and then check out the maximum number of books they would allow you to take. She spent lots of time reading with us. She taught me to cook and to sew, and we were always baking up different kinds of cookies and cakes and pies. My mom did science experiments with us, like the volcanoes made of baking soda, vinegar and food coloring. Or the one with a bowl of milk, drops of food coloring and a drop of dish soap. We made our own rock candy with boiling water, sugar, a popsicle stick and some string. My mom made homemade popsicles that were a million times better than the ones from the grocery store.There were lots of art projects she came up with. Or how about all those times she took us to different parks around town for picnics.
Did my mother ever run or play screaming games with us? Nope. Not that I ever recall. But that doesn't stop me from having all kinds of great memories of my childhood.
I parent a whole lot like my mom parented me. In the summer and over breaks we do something called "Mom School" which sometimes looks a lot like real school (with math worksheets, book reports, and the like) and sometimes looks like an art studio or science lab. We've made balloon rockets, straw shooters, yarn laser mazes, and published our own books. My children have written their own hilarious MadLibs, learned how to bake cookies, and have made two different movies. Plus, we have taken the girls on adventures to eight different states in the past two years.
I am choosing not to be embarrassed by the fact that my children don't think I can run. I don't have to run -- or do any of those other rough-and-tumble things. I don't have to give them mom-memories AND dad-memories. They've got a dad to give them great dad-memories…just like it was for my dad and me. I don't have to be everything-all-the-time to be a good mom or to love my children. I can be good at the things I am good at and, when done out of love, that will be the memory they get to cherish when they're older.
Just to explain, Monster Tag is a game my husband made up that combines tag, hide and seek, and scaring people -- plus lots of running and screaming. The girls LOVE Monster Tag and their favorite place to play it is in the church where my husband pastors. There are lots of places for the "monster" to hide as they wait to jump out and tag their "prey". The wide open spaces of the church building provide a perfect place to run with wild abandon while screaming at the top of your lungs. It's a perfect place to run off energy, especially on rainy or cold days.
What our children don't realize is that Monster Tag is the game my husband usually plays with them when he's giving me some much needed quiet time. He takes the girls to the church while I stay at home to read or nap.
At last night's dinner table the girls throwing around lots of "please" and "pretty please" in their effort to convince us to head to the church for a game. My husband was taking the lead, since Monster Tag is his thing and since he knew I needed a break from the never-ending-sister-bickering-Christmas-Break-madness.
My children don't know about my need for quiet time and breaks from the chaos. They think that I should be having loads of screaming fun playing Monster Tag, too. In the conversation, my ten year old asked why I don't play Monster Tag. And then she innocently asked "You do know how to run, don't you?"
Ouch.
I felt horrible and embarrassed at what my children might secretly think of me. Do they really secretly believe I CAN'T run? We go on walks and bike rides and hikes together….but I rarely ever run. I don't run unless I have to because it usually ends in an painful reminder of that time I fell off the ladder and jacked my knee up. While I reeled inside, my husband gracefully turned the joke around and then changed the subject away from Monster Tag.
The conversation left me feeling very inadequate as a mother. Why DON'T I play rough-and-tumble games with my children? Why DON'T I chase them and make them scream/giggle with delight? Why DON'T I go sledding with them in winter or down the water slides with them in summer? Why DON'T I play catch with them? Worst of all -- does that mean all their happiest childhood memories will be of my husband and not me?
And then -- maybe by the Holy Spirit -- I was reminded of my own mother. She didn't play Monster Tag with us or make us scream/giggle with delight or ride bikes or sled or go down watersides. And, yet, I don't remember ever being concerned about those things because those were the things we did with my dad. Those were my happy "DAD-MEMORIES".
The great thing about my childhood is that I have loads and loads of happy "MOM-MEMORIES", too. My mom was a stay-at-home mom who took us on all sorts of adventures during the summer or breaks from school. Each week during the summer we went to a different library in our county where we would listen to stories and then check out the maximum number of books they would allow you to take. She spent lots of time reading with us. She taught me to cook and to sew, and we were always baking up different kinds of cookies and cakes and pies. My mom did science experiments with us, like the volcanoes made of baking soda, vinegar and food coloring. Or the one with a bowl of milk, drops of food coloring and a drop of dish soap. We made our own rock candy with boiling water, sugar, a popsicle stick and some string. My mom made homemade popsicles that were a million times better than the ones from the grocery store.There were lots of art projects she came up with. Or how about all those times she took us to different parks around town for picnics.
Did my mother ever run or play screaming games with us? Nope. Not that I ever recall. But that doesn't stop me from having all kinds of great memories of my childhood.
I parent a whole lot like my mom parented me. In the summer and over breaks we do something called "Mom School" which sometimes looks a lot like real school (with math worksheets, book reports, and the like) and sometimes looks like an art studio or science lab. We've made balloon rockets, straw shooters, yarn laser mazes, and published our own books. My children have written their own hilarious MadLibs, learned how to bake cookies, and have made two different movies. Plus, we have taken the girls on adventures to eight different states in the past two years.
I am choosing not to be embarrassed by the fact that my children don't think I can run. I don't have to run -- or do any of those other rough-and-tumble things. I don't have to give them mom-memories AND dad-memories. They've got a dad to give them great dad-memories…just like it was for my dad and me. I don't have to be everything-all-the-time to be a good mom or to love my children. I can be good at the things I am good at and, when done out of love, that will be the memory they get to cherish when they're older.
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