Me - The Mother Hen

Every fall I confess that I am the hen in the above you tube video.

After a slower paced, mostly at home, being together kind of a summer,

I do have the slightest tendency to feel like

okay...and act like....

a protective mother hen.

Schedules ramp up.

The calendar becomes a multi-colored mess.

Seven people in three vehicles come and go in a sometimes frenzied pace.

Kids have homework.

Parents get homework (which I do resent, by the way)

There is ballet and soccer and volleyball and football.

There is piano and youth group and home group and Sunday School.

There are field trips and birthday parties 

and team meetings and new committees.

There are teenagers with social lives

and younger ones with endless requests for play dates and sleepovers.

It is ALL GOOD (as they say)

And truly it is.

ALL GOOD.

Wouldn't change any of it.

Our family mission statement is clear

WE LIVE TOGETHER, ENCOURAGING ONE ANOTHER

TO BE AND TO DO WHAT GOD CALLS US TO.

I am so happy to facilitate the madness

for it brings great joy.

It's messy, but joyful.

{Ian and I are far outnumbered if you haven't noticed}

BUT, I do have to, it seems, for a short period of transition, be the mother hen

My instincts count the demands as danger.

I feel protective.
I innately want to gather in my chicks!

I feel that even the good things of life and of childhood and adolescence

and the commitments we all make to service and ministry and community

and friendships 

are perceived dangers.

The demands ascend at once in the fall....and it is, frankly, overwhelming.

They ruffle my feathers for a couple weeks until

we hit our groove and catch our breath and take that collective sigh

{usually around Labor Day}

And I'm okay.  Cuz everyone in my home is okay.

And then, when I'm done acting like a crazy Mother Hen

we get on about our lives.

Our full and happy and crazy adventurous lives.

To God be the glory....Great things He has done!!!