I'm a Good Mom...Today.

When we lived in Houston we RARELY had snow. My mom sent us a package that included some artificial snow. My kids love it.

I, however, do not. In Houston, it was super easy to clean up. I just vacuumed it off the tile.

And although I always coveted hardwood flooring, I never imagined how difficult it is to clean....well, at least my floors. If you can't tell from the picture, the crevices between each board are about a quarter-inch deep. So to clean up the snow, I have to scrape each little flake out of the crevices, vacuum, then dust and mop.

At this point I'm sure you're wondering how this makes me a good mom, right? Well the answer is obvious. I'm letting them play with the snow even though it makes a huge disaster that I will have to go through a painstaking process to clean later.

I also realized that there are a lot of other reasons I'm an exceptionally good mother, TODAY.

1) I let Laynie accessorize her own outfit today. She chose stickers for bracelets and I let her wear them.

2) She has medicine on her face. Usually that makes her scream hysterically, but I did it anyway.

3) Both my kids started the day with socks on. (It's 10:30 and Laynie's already taken hers off...shhh! Don't tell Jamie!)

4) I've done two loads of darks and one load of bed linens.

5) I blow dryed my hair (it would take a whole separate post to explain why that makes me a good mom).

6) I've disciplined my children properly.

7) I had a dance party with my kids. They love The Fray. (And although these pictures are from yesterday, they still apply.)

8) Gav and I worked on some of his awesome dance moves. This one is called the Elbow Shrug. He picked up "hold-your-pants-while-you-dance" from somebody else.

9) And I can (sometimes) get my children to share. Yesterday it was the hat. Today it's the "scoop trucks" and "Loooooooaderrrrrrrrs."

Okay, so this list isn't very impressive. I know there are a lot of incredible mothers who will look at the this post and say, "Really? She has a long way to go." And they are RIGHT!!! But, I've recently realized that it's the small successes (even the speck-size small ones) that are going to get me through the day.

But shouldn't I feel like a good mom because I've done the things that make my kids happy without sacrificing our rules? Sure, I'm not getting the stuff on my list done. But I think - this is still a theory and not a fact - that if I let them do the things they want then I'll have more time to do the things I want.

One piece of evidence: I got this whole post written without a single interruption. Thank you snow!!