Grace.

I have had one of those nights weeks where I feel like I am doing nothing right in this role as a mama. I have recently (although it's something that I struggle with very often) become ridden with guilt over not being able to stay home with Ruby. I often feel like I'm not being the best mom that I could be for her because I only get to see her for 3-4 hours every day, and when we are together I'm usually tired, making dinner, cleaning, doing laundry, and disciplining and teaching the other two kiddos we have in our home right now. Every night when I lay her in her crib, kiss her cheek and walk out of the room I feel like I'm going to cry. Feeling like you're not doing your best at what you view as your most important job ever is pretty gut wrenching. I have noticed this week in my exhaustion that these feelings of not being good enough are consuming me, and making me even more into a person that I do not want to be (how about that?!). I have been impatient and not very graceful with the boys, when all they need is constant patience, love, and support, and I can see it starting to affect all of us in small ways.
Then I sit down after a long, hard day of work, kids, LIFE and reflect on all of these ugly feelings. You know what? The grace that I'm kicking myself for not giving to the boys when they lied about who spilled the juice, or my screaming one year old who just cannot be put down for one second, is what I really need to be giving to myself. That's always good place to start, and finish. Grace. And goodness knows that I'm not great at extending that grace to myself. I'm grateful for a husband that is filled with this grace, and is able to speaks truth to me continuously, reminding me that Ruby is loved and she knows it. She's loved at home, she's loved at daycare, and she already at the ripe old age of 13 months exudes the love she receives and dishes it out so well. She is a thriving, happy, and smart little girl who is well taken care of. I am blessed to have a job that helps us feed our family, allows us to have health insurance, and welcome other children that do not have a place to call home into our home to love them, care for them, buy them clothes and teach them about Jesus. Sometimes though? It's hard to keep those thoughts in the forefront. This guilt, this "mom guilt", is crippling.

But he said to me, "my grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness." Therefore, I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ's power may rest on me. That is why, for Christ's sake, I will delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong. (2 Cor. 12:9&10)

His grace is sufficient. His grace is waiting for me in the morning when I wake up in a dark house to the sounds of the ones I love sleeping peacefully around me. His grace is there when I softly kiss my sleeping baby good-bye for the day. His grace is there as I drive to work wishing I could have more time with my girl. His grace reminds me that this life, this crazy wonderful journey is a long winding road of figuring out how get better at trusting Him. "Trusting that the God who built our kids will parent them in our absence, will grow them in courage, and teach them over time that this is what love looks like. Gritty, committed, and determined to do what is necessary."*

And drenched in grace, friends. Drenched in grace.  

*(taken from this amazing blog)