Summer experiment update... which leads to a tangent

My computer crashed a few weeks ago, like really died, crashed. So it was gone for over a week and it came back with a new empty hard drive. That became my excuse for why I wasn't blogging about meaningful moments with my kids. But to be honest, I just stopped looking. As with most great ideas I have, I am inconsistent in follow through. They have watched entirely too much tv, you tube videos, played too much on my kindle and the xbox, and I have excused it with, well, we've been out for baseball so much they need a break. Whatever. Baseball is over tomorrow so I will not be able to use that excuse anymore, and I will again have to be proactive in finding things for them to do, and making memorable moments happen. They rarely happen by accident. They take effort, sometimes planning ahead. Yes, sometimes the spontaneous events of life bring great memories, but spontaneous things will not happen if I let them sit in front of screens all day.

Can I be gut wrenchingly honest here? I'm having one of those "I'm a failure" days, for lots of reasons. This lack of purposeful parenting mentioned above is only one aspect of that. I know we all have days like that. I know in my heart that it isn't truth. It's lies from the evil one or lies from my fleshly side that think I should be super mom and wife and minister. I need God to speak His loving truth into my spirit. I've heard some amazing sermons the past few days. Check out Passion City Church from May 5 and May 12. I have to learn to love myself because God commands us to love our neighbors as we love ourselves, so if we don't love ourselves, our neighbors will be jilted and not see the love of God the way He wants them to. I need to be reminded that I am loved, that the mistakes I make in being a wife, mother, friend or minister for the most part will not affect eternity. I need to learn from them and move on, because if I walk around down on myself, grumpy and sad, no one will want what I have. And that could affect someone's eternity.

So I will pick myself back up, go to God's word and read His truth about me, listen to and sing some worship so the attention gets off myself, pray for forgiveness and joy to return, and get up tomorrow and try again. His mercies are new every morning!