Are We Fostering A Bad Attitude?

I hate this time of year.  Not because Summer has decided it has had enough of the heat (like me), and will be making an exit soon.  Not because Fall is peeking their pretty eyes through the trees at me reminding me that Winter is on the way.  Oh and certainly not because my brood , and the King Bee, have already started reminding me how many days until Christmas there are (a bunch of meanie heads I tell you!) The thing that gets me is this "YIPPEEEEEE my kids are no longer in my hair" mentality that comes from so many moms on social media.

As you know my dears, we HOMESCHOOL.  So we don't have to do the Back-to-School shopping, meetings and paperwork with the school, or the consoling the kid who is anxious over a new teacher or a notorious "bad" teacher.  But what I do have to deal with is this:

Today, while thumbing through my Facebook, the picture above came across from a friend who liked and shared it. Now looking at this, you can understand that the Mom is VERY excited about something. At a second glance, you see the kids are not partaking in Mom's enthusiasm. This is a picture of normalcy that many parents in the world are taking this month.

Not me. I'm relishing in the fact that I get to spend so much time with my kids. It's a opportunity that not many families can choose to have and I'm thankful that ours can. I try to not judge parents who express this type of joy, but it is very very difficult some days...like today. I hear so many parents say they can't wait to get their kids out of their hair when they know school starts in 3 days! I often think to myself, "Self, I bet those kids can't wait to get her out of their hair too!" But then I feel a teensy bit of remorse for my judgmental ways and go eat some chocolate.

It's not rocket science though to understand that many of our children's bad attitudes toward their parents come from attitudes like what we see above. I know that when I see a change in my kids behaviors I eventually start looking to myself and usually find that my attitude toward them (or life in general) is the cause of whatever issue we are having with each other. And believe me, being in the house with your kids, and sometimes the husband, can cause some major attitude failures for Mom. It's a tough Love situation everyday of a mom's life if she is doing it right. I guess that is one of the reasons we see so many pictures like the one above. Tough Love is hard to deal with and trying to do it on a day-in and day-out basis is exhausting for public school and homeschooling moms alike.

I encourage all moms to take a look at your attitude, and your heart, when you see that your kids are having some respect and attitude issues toward you...or toward life too! It may just be that you (and me) are fostering this environment and we need to check our self before we wreck our self! You are the BOMB cause you are the MOM!

Joy is a weapon we use to fight life's battles!

-Margaret Feinberg

(I mean seriously...look at the oldest child in that picture. Does she not have that look on her face that says, "I'm just as excited to get away from her as she is from me!")