Here’s the thing with mothering.
For the most part, it’s a continuous series of small things. Little moments. Tiny nuances. Modest adjustments.
That all make up this huge thing called motherhood.
And without sounding patronizing or overbearing, can I just say this?
Can I just give you this encouragement?
Those small things you’re doing, the thing no one seem to see, the ones that aren’t photo op worthy and don’t merit a pithy or poignant blog post, those moments?
Can I tell you?
It matters.
It does.
It adds up.
I’m still in the thick of it, the mothering. I’ve still got a passel of kids in the house and we’re still making the run to soccer and searching for cleats and running through spelling words and fixing poor penmanship and trying to make dental hygiene a dependable habit instead of an option.
But.
Because of the number of kids in our crew and because of the seventeen year age span from youngest to oldest, we’ve got our original test subjects launched.
Into the world.
Into careers and relationships and taxes and
The pioneers of our parenting practice, the ones we cut our teeth on.
Well, not literally.
But still.
And they report back to us from the fields of adulting, they tell us of what worked and what stuck and what didn’t. They give case studies like veteran anthropologists of the family culture we built, by intention and by accident.
And what they tell us is this.
It was the small things.
The little conversation while making dinner.
The humble efforts for relationship.
The string of moments we listened.
The insubstantial gifts of a favorite treat or an interesting book.
The short quote, the small insight, the peek into an approach.
It was those things, compounded over the years, that mattered. That made something bigger. That equipped in bite-size portions. That made steps for the journey. That added up.
So, mamas.
You’re doing it.
You’re doing the right things.
The little things.
The small things.
That build the bigger vision.
You’re doing it.
And it matters.
And while it can seem right now that no one notices and no one sees, it is recorded. In the hearts of your kids. In the memory banks that define love. In the practices of a life lived after launch from your home.
Embrace the small.
Do the little.
Be faithful in the seed.
Because it’s huge.
It really is.
