When I look at this picture I see my beautiful daughter, freshly promoted from Kindergarten to the wilds of 1st Grade. I see a creative, intelligent, humorous, loving, bright and passionate child of God. I also, in my mind's eye, see her as a bright-eyed 18 year old also in a cap and gown... and I know she's going to grow up really, really fast. But I also know she's going to stay true to who she is and has always been, the way God made her. No matter what size cap and gown she's wearing. Not because she's awesome, even though she is. She'll stay true because she hates change. Wink.

If you are a mom of young kids like me, don't waste these years striving for "what comes next". I think there is a big pull on us moms to get our kids to the next level of development and maturity. When they're infants, we desperately want them to start sleeping through the night. When they're babies, we can't wait for first foods, first teeth, first steps, first words. When they are pre-schoolers, we just wish they could dress themselves and consistently brush their own teeth, get their own snacks, read their own books 10 times in a row if that's what makes them happy. Because we're busy, and its aggravating to stop what you're doing umpteenmillion times to help someone who just wants to do it "mysef!"

But. These years we have our kids as kids at home are not about us. It's not about how much sleep we're getting, or how much reading we get done, or shows we watch uninterrupted, or how clean our homes are, how done our laundry is, how put together we seem, or how bone-weary busy we are chasing the whole brood. It's not even about how much we're reading our bibles and praying and having "quiet time", or whatever you call you spiritual disciplines, if you keep them. It's not about us. If you're a mom of little ones, it's about the little ones. That is sacrificial. That is good. That is sanctifying. That is even holy.

I've thought about compiling a list of "things I wish someone had told me instead of letting me figure out the hard way" for a blog post. Maybe I'll still do a whole list on that, but this truth is one of those things someone DID tell me, (Jane Slusher, I'm talking about you!) and I'm glad that by the grace of God I listened:

You will never regret the time you spend with your children when they're young. You will NEVER regret it. 

I might regret buying a home and being tied to a money sucking mortgage. I might regret not being able to work full time and bring in a substantial income that affords us all kinds of luxuries. I might regret letting myself eat with abandon in my pregnancies. I might regret not traveling more, or not going after a traditional degree, or buying a Hyundai instead of a Ford. But I will never regret the time I've spent and am spending with my kids, right now.

I don't regret being with Leah in her classroom, volunteering as room mom and doing centers and helping in the lunch room all year. I don't regret teaching Susie's worship hour Sunday school class most Sundays and rarely getting to sit in big church. I don't regret having to go grocering and erranding with girls in tow. I don't regret curling up with one or the other or both at night while we fall asleep together. I don't regret reading big stacks of books to them whenever we need a cool-down session. I don't regret frog catching adventures in the park, sporting a bathing suit in public so they can swim safely, or doing so many underdogs on the swings that I think my brain might explode from the boredom of it... I don't regret it at all.

When Leah wears that cap and gown as a stunning young lady on the brink of adulthood, and walks across a stage to receive another diploma signifying many more years of hard work, development and maturity, I hope she'll look out and see her crazy old mom in the audience yelling "Woo hoo! Go Leah!!!" and know she is treasured and loved above all because her mom always gave her the most precious things she owned: her time, and her love.

And now I'm bawling.