Summer Break?

This post is for all you at home mom's out there who are busy busy planning your kids summer break so it will be fun, educational, and entertaining. You hope by making such a detailed plan of lessons, camps, play dates, "school" work, and projects, that you will limit hearing the dreaded words, "I'm bored" from your children. I too am guilty of all this. I have printed my summer schedule and posted on the fridge. We started immediately the day after school was out with our play school time (my attempt at summer homeschooling) and projects for home and others. Still, by 4:30 in the afternoon when they're tired of playing video games, nothing is on TV, they don't want to play with toys or do school work, I hear "There's nothing to do!" which to a mom who has devoted 100% of herself to planning the perfect summer is like a punch in the gut. So what to do?


Stop trying to be perfect! In all of my planning, I came across an awesome website of a Christian home school mom that has tons of free resources on it. It's called Confessions of a Homeschooler. While I was taking advantage of all the free phonics printables I came across the real reason the Lord probably led me to that site in a post called "Super Mom vs. Abiding Mom". I highly suggest every woman who has sacrificed her career to be a 100% in the home  mom print this out and put it somewhere where you can see it daily. It seems that almost every mom I know has at some point struggled with the underappreciated, unpaid, unmeasurable role of motherhood.  Stop thinking the Lord will have some great assignment for you in the future when your kids get big enough for you to go back to work and realize He's already given you the greatest assignment right now in raising your children! This is a reminder to make sure our priorities are right in that everything we do is for the Lord first. 

Super Mom	Abiding Mom
Does	Is (Psalm 46:10)
Tries to impress others	Pleases the Lord (Eph. 5:10,Proverbs 29:25)
Is controlled by an agenda(curriculum, schedule, etc)	Is controlled by the Holy Spirit: (Gal. 5:22-26) (Uses curriculum & schedules as tools for orderliness so she's more free to follow the spirit)
Her self worth is found in her accomplishments (clean house, perfect kids, the perfect bulletin boards, etc.)	Her self worth is found in an accurate view of who she is in Christ Jesus (Eph 2:10)
Her peace is found in the “perfect” environment	Her peace is found in Jesus in the midst of any storm (Is 26:3)
She is discouraged by failure	Failure reminds her that God's strength is made perfect in weakness (2 Cor. 12:9-10)
She expects perfection from herself and others	She practices grace with herself and others (Eph 4:32)
She teaches her kids to be good	She teaches her kids to be Godly (Proverbs 22:6)
She is frustrated with her lack of spiritual fruit	She abides in Christ and bears much fruit (John 15:5)
She does things with her children	She builds a relationship with her children (Deut 6:6-7)
Her perspective is based on what is seen	Her perspective is based on what is unseen (Col 3:2)
She chooses quantity of activities	She chooses the most excellent Way (I Cor 13)