A Full Quiver

I woke up this morning thinking about how to blog about some of the feeling that I have been having lately.  My life is so full and blessed because of my children.  I cannot think of anything more important to be then a wife, mother and a nana.  In American news lately there has been some harshly spoken words on the validity of women working outside the home and those that stay at home.

I have been in both places: for the first 10 years of parent hood I was working outside the home and for the last 20 years I have been able to stay at home.  Both are hard and both have made me realized that any kind of WORK is just plain hard.  I have also received blessing from working.  While in the work force I was able to go out for power lunches, had a nice wardrobe, and received pay raises and vacation and sick time.

When I chose to stay at home those blessing ceased to exist – but I received blessing nonetheless, the ability to hug each of my children when they came home from school, smiles on their dirty faces, providing a listening ear whenever THEY wanted to talk and to hold their hands and to wipe their eyes when things got tough. 

I worked hard outside the home, it was hard to leave my first daughter with the babysitter at 6 weeks old – but economics required it.  When our son was born my husband when back for his MBA we had to down size and economize because we both worked part time jobs.  WORK is hard and being a good mother is a lot of  hard work ;whether I am working out of the home or in the home …and yet I find that I have been extremely happy through it all.

I was reminded of a few verses in Psalms 127…

“Lo, children are an heritage of the LORD: and the fruit of the womb is his reward…happy is the man that hath his quiver full of them.”

I am not sure if having four children constitutes a “quiver full” but then I have had so many children pass through my front door I can no longer count them all.  Some stay for a few days, others stay for months or even years and yet there are some that know that my door is always open and keep returning time and time again. 

Just a few of the extra children in my quiver

I can truly say that being a good mother has been hard work, being a good nana is no work at all, it is blessing for having worked hard to be a good mother!  My quiver is full and runneth over.