Who I Am Not

Who I Am Not:

Yes, I have an education, but it wasn't my focus. My husband and I finished high school, met in the summer after graduation, and married the next spring.

We have never been ones who have let grass grow under our feet, so to speak. I was eighteen when we married and nineteen when our first child was born.

Decisions:

My husband and I based our decision for me to be a stay at home mom on several experiences. His mother was the 'excellent proverbial Proverbs woman'. She could cook, sew, plant, harvest, and put up her produce, besides running her home.

My mother was a divorced single woman. Although she was an extremely capable woman, if it hadn't been for my Grandparents my sister and I would not have had a home.

My Grandmother would have been seen as a capable Proverbs type woman similar to my mother-in-law. I could easily see which type of woman I wanted to be and the example of house and home I desired for our family.

Kids Don't Care:

My Grandmother was a trained dietitian, but when I fell and had a boo boo, I didn't care. I just wanted a hug and maybe a band-aide. Or maybe I wanted a story. If I was hungry it didn't impress me what level of education my Grandmother had, or if I was tired I wanted to be tucked in.

There is a saying that's been going around for years, "People don't care how much you know, until they know how much you care."

I do not agree with that saying so much in sharing the Gospel with a dying world, but I do agree with it when you put a different word with it: "Children don't care how much you know, they need to know how much you care."

Abandoned:

As I've stated before, not just fathering but parenting patterns are passed down from generation to generation. Since the family patterns have shifted from agriculture/village culture to our current day system we've jettisoned the parenting patterns of the past.

At one time neither parent went off to work. In a village each family supplied something the other families needed. The butcher, baker, candle stick maker, the tailor, the potter, shoemaker—the list went on. And it was done from the home, even women could spin, make yarn, and so forth, from their own home, and children were raised by both mother and father, even by grandparents in their own homes.

Today we see nice homes, excuse me, nice houses with no one home. Since dad and mom have both gone off to work when children come home it is often to raise themselves.

This was another cog in the decision my husband and I used to have me as a stay at home mom. We did not want to continue the cycle we saw happening around us. Admittedly we didn't understand the what and why things were happening around us, but we were trying to follow God's plan and we were sure this was part of the idea that 'the buck stops here' and this was our line in the sand.

Who I Am Not:

I am not my mother, although she had her positive points. I am not my Grandmother nor my mother-in-law, even as good examples as they were. I am first and foremost a child of God trying to follow His will. Using the scriptures as our guide we have tried to follow God's plan. Have we done so perfectly? No, but navigating in a world where the pattern is almost lost is like following through a trackless sea.

"Praise ye the LORD. I will praise the LORD with my whole heart, in the assembly of the upright, and in the congregation. The works of the LORD are great, sought out of all them that have pleasure therein. His work is honourable and glorious: and his righteousness endureth for ever." (Psalms 111:1-3 KJV)