Forgiveness (lessons from a 3 year old).

Harley is a little girl at the CDC who stays after school until about 4:30 every day... i.e. Kim and I spend a LOT of time with her. She tries to go barefoot on a regular basis, but we never let her because it's against the rules. We're on the playground today and she's taken off her flip flops again. I tell her, "You need to put your shoes back on or we're going to have to go back inside." She doesn't do anything. I say, "You have until the count of 3 to get your shoes back on or we're going inside... 1... 2... 3." She gets her shoes in her hand and is putting them on in time while whining about it. Then she says, "I'm mad at you! You counted at me!" I replied, "Well, you weren't putting your shoes back on, so that's what I needed to do." Then I left her alone while she played on the jungle gym.

A few minutes went by and she said, "I want to race you." I responded with, "I thought you were mad at me." To this she said, "I'm not mad at you." Kim and I laughed about how easy forgiveness is for a 3 year old and I went over to race her. Then she told me, "You're my best friend," and my heart melted a little, of course. I think our lives would be so much better if we could forgive and forget as easily as that little girl.

Semi-violent kid story

Yesterday, as the kids were lining up to go outside after playing on the playground, Kameryn (she's the one with the best twang) was holding a caterpillar. She stated angrily, "This caterpillar PUKED on me!" I had to stifle my laughter because I didn't think that it was possible for someone to know about a caterpillar's bodily fluids and then I told her, "You need to leave the caterpillar out here because you're not allowed to take it inside." She looked at it for a few seconds, then threw it down on the ground and stomped on it a couple of times. I told her to stop doing that and said to Susan (one of the other teachers), "Oh my gosh... I wonder what she'll do if one of her kids pukes on her once she's a mom." Then we all went inside for nap time.

Happy Mother's Day! (shout-out to Mama Boyd)

When I started writing this blog back in August, I said that I was going to write some stories about the people that I admire. My mom has been one of the most important people in my life and I figured that today is the right day to write a blog about her... especially since she's one of the 3 people who actually read this :). Here are the top 10 things that I love about my mom:

1) She loves Jesus more than anything and I know that she has spent a lot of time covering Emily and me in prayer.
2) She loves my dad so much and knows that she's a lucky woman because she has him as a husband.
3) Her ability to find out the life story of pretty much anyone within 10 minutes of meeting them.
4) Her willingness to drop everything and listen when I'm struggling.
5) Her ability to drag information out of me when I don't know how much I've bottled up inside (I usually end up crying, which is good because that doesn't happen very often).
6) She's never tried to give me her opinion on the things that I should do with my life and has always supported my decisions.
7) She's taught me that sometimes you can cheer up by eating frozen yogurt or buying something cute.
8) She's great with kids, especially when it comes to being consistent and following through on what she says.
9) She knows how to make awkward situations more comfortable by saying the right things.
10) She's great at spending quality time with those she loves. Some examples: going to Hawaii for my high school graduation, going to New York for Emmy's high school graduation, Tuesday night "date nights" when I was growing up, Thursday night "date nights" with Daddy, etc.

I'm so thankful that God picked her to be my mom and wish that everyone could have one just like her!