Scrap Girls Digital Scrapbooking Forum: Viewing image It's just a Phase - Scrap Girls Digital Scrapbooking Forum

Maybe this isn't totally PC. I don't think that scrapbookers are supposed to feel this way. At least, they aren't supposed to admit that they feel this. Right? But, this is how I felt yesterday. So, I made a page. I couldn't think of a photo that would go with it, so I didn't include one.

Journling:

Sometimes, I dread Sundays. I know I’m not supposed to feel that way. I know Sunday is supposed to be a day of rest, a day to recharge, a day for God and family. But I dread them, just the same.

Take today, for example. Trying to keep Jared quiet is impossible. He’s pulling the hair of the lady sitting in front of us. He’s chewing up goldfish crackers, spitting them out, and rubbing them into my skirt. My mom wrote about my brother in her journal, “Holding Nathan in church is somewhat akin to holding a wild bobcat, only harder.” That is a perfect description of holding Jared in church. Loud and messy and sharp little teeth and fingernails.

Then comes primary. By the end, I don’t know whether to scream or cry. How can my class turn a perfectly nice lesson about the Holy Ghost into an argument about whether a soldier with a machete or a shark is stronger? I wonder what they tell their parents the lesson was about?

After church is the mad rush to get two tired kids home and fed so they can have short naps before going to Grandma’s for dinner. Today, neither one slept. Dinner at Grandma’s is another Sunday tradition. One that I usually dread. It’s terrible to say, I know, but it’s true. My in-law’s house is perfect. It reminds me of a model home. So clean, and beautifully decorated. Why is it that at home, we can get through a meal in relative peace, but at Grandma’s, you’d think my kids have never even silverware or napkins? You’d think we just dumped some food on the floor and let them lick it off, the way they eat at Grandma’s. Today, we had chicken parmesan and pasta with marinara. Marinara sauce to be eaten at the dinning room table, with chairs upholstered in white fabric. With white carpeting beneath the table. Megan was sticking her hand in her cup, and then licking water off her fingers. She was sticking pasta to her forehead. She was pouring salt in other people’s drinks. Jared was smashing peas and throwing them. He was chewing chicken up, spitting it out, and throwing it. All while squealing at the top of his lungs.

I know Sunday is when we are supposed to refill our spiritual cups, but lately, I feel like my cup has been replaced with a paper one-that has been stepped on repeatedly.

When I was a little girl and my friends were being mean, I remember my mother saying, “It’s just a phase.” Sometimes she’d say it so often I wanted to scream, but now, with a little more perspective, I know it’s true. It’s just a phase. Phases come and go. Someday soon, I’ll sit on a pew at church and the only fight I’ll have is to keep Travis awake. And I’ll look at all the harried young mothers struggling with small children, and I’ll miss those days. And I’ll have forgotten all of this....

Sometimes, like tonight, I miss my mom so much. I wonder what advice she would give me. I wonder if she would let me cry or make me laugh. Wonder what Sunday dinner at her house would be like. And I’m so jealous of people who grew up with a mom. And then I remember things she said to me when I was little, and how they still apply. And it helps, somehow. This is just a phase.

I used:
A Collage Unleashed SNU
SS Brushed 2 paper templates EHI
SSEmbTemp HodgePodge TCS
A Little Worn Out BHA
Just the Basics EHI
SS Paper Stained EHI
SSEmbel Curled JHI
SSTools Inked Edges Neutrals 4102 CBA
SSTools Styles Curled Edges
Shadows 3201