The Joy of the Morning

You may have read that title and decided you’d just pass on this post. I get it.  Joy in the morning?  Who says that?

Now granted, as a homeschool mom we typically aren’t doing the mad rush of getting everyone up, dressed, fed, and out the door with everything they need for the day within an hour of waking.  Well, except on appointment days, & Co-op days, like today.

Our standard mornings are a bit more relaxed.  Breakfast and getting dressed happen by about 7:30, but school doesn’t start until 8:30, and I’m not too picky about what the kids show up wearing when we’re just at home for the day.  Although, I must admit my two oldest kiddos are a couple of sharp dressers, and set the bar kinda high for me when we do go out, or have company over for the day!  What they can do with a mostly Granimals and No Boundaries wardrobe amazes me!

For me, the real pure joy of the morning doesn’t come while I’m pouring cereal or frying eggs for kiddos who are sleepily shuffling their way across the kitchen floor dragging blankets and stirring up dust.

The real pure joy comes in that few minutes, sometimes even up to an hour if I’m well disciplined, where I am up while the kiddos are still in bed.

If you’re reading this and thinking “but I’m SOOOO tired”, and you’re thinking there is no way you can get up before your kids, I’ve been there, I understand.

Sometimes you really are just in a season of needing more rest, like when there’s a newborn in the house, or a sick kiddo.  Those are legitimate reasons to stay under the covers a little bit longer.  Visit this blog post again later when you aren’t in those seasons.  Because in those seasons, rest is best.

 

In the morning my husband’s alarm goes off a couple of times.  He gets out of bed and heads into the shower.  Ordinarily I wake for a minute, hear the shower and it puts me right back to sleep.  I’ve decided however that as the beautiful background noise of the shower fills the quiet house, I’m to be getting up.

I roll over, grab my phone and start with reading the Bible.  My real Bible is on my nightstand, but if I had to flip on the light to start reading at 6am, it just wouldn’t happen.  So with my screen as dim as it can be, I start reading the word of God and praying.  I think of everything that is causing me anxiety for the day, or things I left undone the day before and I pray over it.  All of it.

Sometimes this takes a few minutes, sometimes I’m there a whole lot longer.

Then I have two choices, I can either put my phone back down and go back to sleep, or I can get up and start this beautiful day with the wisdom I have gained from the readings.  Okay, and option 3, I check my e-mails, scroll my Facebook and IG feeds.  Option 3 has been used quiet often in the past, but I really have been trying to get away from that, because I know I’ll be checking it again by 9am anyway, and often what I read on Facebook puts me in much different mood than what I had hoped to be starting the day with (maybe just because it’s close to the election, maybe because I’m mindlessly scrolling too far).

Today I heard that shower start up and I jumped up, hurried to the kitchen and started frying eggs for Mr. Awesome.  Making him breakfast, filling his water bottle for the day, and making sure he has his well-rounded lunch (that he packed himself the night before), THAT is the stuff that brings me joy.

When he shuffled to the kitchen and said “Good Morning” I replied back with a smile and told him his breakfast was on the counter, to which he replies a dull “oh cool”.  No thank you, no verbal appreciation, no physical appreciation like a pat on the back or a kiss on the cheek.  Just “oh cool”.

He finished in under 2 minutes, put the plate in the sink and after a brief hug and kiss, he was headed out the door.

You know what?  10 years ago this would’ve ticked me off, I would’ve been sure he knew it and the neighbors within a mile radius would’ve known it too, I didn’t care if it was 5 or 6am.  If I got my butt out of bed to make him breakfast, I was expecting at minimum a THANK YOU.  A plaque on the wall and a glamorous spot on the evening news would’ve been more like it!

Thank God I’ve matured from that phase, because that was miserable for both of us.

The joy is in knowing that my husband has a good breakfast in him to help him tackle the day.  I know he’s grateful for me, and for my efforts.  I don’t need the verbal thank you, I just need him to keep waking up and taking on each day, working hard for our family, like he always does.

There is JOY to be found in the morning.  It doesn’t come in the thank yous, or even in the getting things crossed off the to-do list early.  It comes in the form of quiet moments with God, it comes in serving my family (see below), and it comes in cultivating peace within the home, as only a mother can.

 

Ways to Serve your Family in the Morning:

• Nursing the baby
• Packing lunches or preparing snacks
• Filling up water bottles
• Wiping up last night’s crumbs
• Unloading the dishwasher, even though the kids are supposed to do it
• Making breakfast
• Writing little love notes and sticking them around the house to be found
• Reading the word of God so that you may be refreshed and ready to minister to whatever life brings to your tribe each day

What ways can you think of to serve your family in the morning?

 

 

 

To declare Your lovingkindness in the morning And Your faithfulness by night

Psalm 92:2