Dear Young Mother....

Thank you for your visit today with your two young children.  I appreciated and enjoyed it.

I saw you look with a little envy at the clean kitchen counter; the living room floor without any Legos or dolls scattered around; the decorative blanket on the couch that wasn't draped into tents covering all the furniture; no Play Dough scrunched into the carpet.

I notice you looked at the bowl of candy and nuts sort of longingly as if they would not last a minute at your home and they would be scattered all over the coffee table.

You apologized profusely when your son started to bang on the table with your keys and when he started to whine and your daughter began to cry.  You felt uncomfortable during the visit because my home is so quiet, so orderly, and I know yours with four young children is hectic, cluttered, noisy, and filled with LIFE.

But, let me tell you this:  YOU NEEDN't HAVE HAD ANY OF THOSE FEELINGS.

Because, you see, I totally get it.

I've been there - just exactly where you are.

I've walked into a home with small children and felt so uncomfortable and awkward and out of place and like, "what am I doing here?"

SO, here's the thing; TRULY......

EVERYTHING will change.

I'm sure you get tired of hearing people tell you how quickly it will pass.....

Not when you are struggling to change ANOTHER diaper, wipe up another runny nose, hear the whiney cry of, "Mom, I'm hungry," trip over another toy car, spend a sleepless night with a child who is coughing and fevered, look with dismay at the piles of laundry scattered all over the house, get the kids buckled in the car only to have one of them say they need to go potty; feel like you can't take another minute of the chaos, noise, fighting, whining, bickering, teasing, screams, tantrums, clutter.

Oh, yes, beautiful young mother; things WILL change - it may not seem to go quickly when you are in the thick of it, but it will happen.

And, you too will have an orderly home, a quiet home, no fingerprints, no dust, no scattered toys on the floor, no cookie crumbs in the carpet, no noise.  And, you too, will have a young mother visit you.

You will look with fond memories and think, as I often do, I've been there.  It was hard, it was a challenge, it was lonely, it meant long hours; but now, I reap the rewards of having done it by enjoying being with my adult children; they are good, they are inspiring, they are good parents of their own.  They bring me great JOY that I may have missed in the day-to-day struggle of raising them.   

Now, I will be content with this situation knowing I fought the fight.

I will enjoy this time in my life.

And, then the grandchildren will come rushing thru the front door and you will smile and say with GLEE, "Let the Destruction and the FUN begin!"