(Patience) Momma Said There’d Be Days Like This… But the Fruit of the Spirit is .. Patience

The Day from Hades 

(Titled by my children years later) 

You can learn many things from children. How much patience you have, for instance.

~ Franklin P. Jones

Oh where do I begin? I still can get the visible shakes if I dwell too long on this day. We were babysitting our friend’s son, affectionately named Mr. Motorcycle. The father had been serving in Operation Desert Storm for a few years and was finally brought home. He and his wife needed a second honeymoon. We were more than happy to have this delightful child stay with us for almost 2 weeks. He was Ms. Bunny’s best buddy already.  No problems, right?

Day 1. I awoke to find Ms. Bunny and Mr. Motorcycle practicing their alphabet writing by using red nail polish on the underside of my couch cushions. Both looked highly annoyed with me when I started to hyperventilate.

Day 2. Himself had already left for work. Around 6 am I was asleep and weird noises kept happening in my dreamland. As I became more awake, I heard, ‘plop, plop, plop,’ followed by whispered giggles. I kept trying to place the odd noises but nothing made sense in my too early to be awake cobwebbed world. Then the epiphany hit! The Kids! Were they hurt? Was someone trying to break into the house? Was the house being pelted by ‘plops?’

I dashed from my bedroom in a full bore run to the kitchen! As my feet left carpet and landed on tile, I slipped on something slimy and fell backwards onto my backside and then back and slid all the way to the sink cupboards that finally stopped me. Looking up  towards the ceiling, I see all three of my bambinos, and Mr. Motorcycle standing on the counters. All four were frozen holding fresh eggs in their hands. They were dropping them to the floor from different levels to see the difference in sound made. They had done this with 2 dozen eggs already.  Needless to say, I was not impressed, but my head and back hurt too much at the moment and my waist long hair had slimy goop all in it.

I got up and carefully moved each child to the carpet so they would not slip and get hurt. I then sat all of them on the alphabet sofa and scolded them. I sent them downstairs to the playroom to play quietly and to watch some Christian Donut Man tapes while I cleaned up the kitchen. Have you ever chased egg whites across a floor? Have you ever chased 2 dozen of them across a tiled floor? I attacked them with a dust pan, scooping them up for an hour, and then mopped the floor several times so that no residue was left. It was now only 7 am.

I headed downstairs to the playroom to check on the children whom I just knew were being perfect angels after my scolding. ‘Oh my goodness,’ is all that went through my mind. My girls had plastic baby buggies. They all also had little plastic shovels from the summer. These sweet babies took the baby buggies into the laundry room and filled them up with powder laundry detergent. Then they took these buggies into the large playroom and were making it ‘snow’ by pitching the detergent up in the air with the shovels. There was a fine mist of detergent all over the carpeting. I made all 4 of them sit on the sofa downstairs and once again scolded them and told them to sit still with their hands folded on their laps and not to make a sound while I got the vacuum and cleaned this all up. I pulled out my expensive Rainbow vacuum that my parents gave us for our wedding present, and began to pull up the white powder.

The kids started giggling. I gave them the most unhappy mommy look I could muster up and quieted them down and continued vacuuming. Again, laughter erupts from these fallen cherubs.  As I was getting ready to really scold them again, I looked back at my vacuum. Bubbles. Everywhere. Piles of bubbles. Everywhere. For those that are not aware, a Rainbow vacuum uses a water filtration system. Oh my goodness. The only thing I could do at this point was laugh. I grabbed the kids and we dove into the bubbles and made a memory. A much more pleasant memory than we had started out with. It was not even 8am yet. We chose to restart the day!

 

1 Corinthians 10:13

Common English Bible (CEB)

¹³ No temptation has seized you that isn't common for people. But God is faithful. He won’t allow you to be tempted beyond your abilities. Instead, with the temptation, God will also supply a way out so that you will be able to endure it.     

(Bubbles… Our way out. hahaha)

Prayer Time

Father, thank you for bubbles. Cleansing bubbles. Thank you for giving us patience and wisdom in all situations. Help me to also see the humor in situations that at first seem bleak. Help me to see my children as you see them. Help me to be flexible at all times and to be in tune with your Holy Spirit. Amen.

Copyright © 2015 Christine Osberghaus