Today was one of fabulous creations, wide smiles and glorious mess.
Alathea and I made “Ali-bars”…a concoction of oats, honey, peanut butter, raisins, shredded coconut, chopped walnuts…and plenty of colorful sprinkles. Lavishly ‘measured’ {word used very loosely} by Ali herself as she sat on the counter, she had a blast heaping, scooping, sprinkling, stirring and licking {not necessarily in that order}.
I find that if I’m not careful to fight it, I fall naturally into a very controlling, no-mess, predictable style of parenting…which often leads to an uncontrollable, messy, bored child. So I’m trying to let my hair down more often and intentionally throw caution to the wind. Will watching Veggietales twice in a row and eating more ingredients than actually go into a recipe once in a while in fact kill the girl? Or me, for that matter?
No, most probably not.
I want to be more spontaneous and fun, I really do! I know I need to be more purposeful in carving out time to have silly, unadulterated, messy fun with my child.
Life is just too short not to.
And while it’s scary, it is so important…not only for her development and for our relationship, but for me to fully understand what is ultimately most important in life.
No woman ever said on her death bed, “I wish I had stayed up on the laundry more”. Or “I wish I had kept the floors cleaner”. Or “I wish I had decluttered the clutter more”.
No. They usually mourn the missed opportunities for late night fort construction or glittery mud-pie creation.
While I crave structure and organization {like most women crave the newest Gucci sunglasses}, I fear my propensity to pursue it has the potential to squelch the insatiable zest for life God has placed in the heart of every child.
What a tragedy that would be.
So, in my pursuit of the radical {radical, fantasmigorical moments with my sweet girl, in this instance}…along with magically delicious Ali-bars, we made melted-wax-crayon-creations to hang on nana’s Christmas tree. I think I had more fun than she did {after all…I got to hold the sharp knife and chop the crayons up into tiny, little pieces…and wield the hot iron!}.
And it was while hanging up our particularly large m-w-c-c in nana’s kitchen window that I realized how much like my life that glorious, melted mess was.
Just when I’m tempted to throw in the towel because a specific area of my life is out of my control or not cooperating the way I think it should {like my embarrassing need to discard wax crayons once broken, peeled of their paper wrapper or imperfect in any other [pathetic] little way in my effort to keep her craft supplies looking Martha Stewartesque…everyone say [recovering] “OCD”!}…God takes all the ugly, useless little bits, melts them together with the heat of adversity and before our very eyes, a delightfully colorful creation emerges.
One that, when held up to the light, allows the SON to shine through, creating a masterpiece that causes even the worst perfectionist among us {ahem} to stop and say, “hmm…not too shabby. Not too shabby at all!!”.
What a resourceful Creator we have! He just doesn’t waste a thing!
And thanks to His passion for making beauty out of ashes, my life has become a {beautiful} mess indeed!
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