I come from a large family. I have 9 siblings and 2 parents. Some of us are loud and opinionated. Some of us are quiet and reserved. Some take over. Some sit back. Some love a party and others prefer solitude. Some are entrepreneurs and some are scholars. (And all are going to hate that I posted this retro pick. He he.)

Dinner dishes go down one of two ways at my house. First, is the “I am tired; Dad is gone; Leave me alone” method. This is when I send all the kids outside to play and I do the dishes all by myself. The kids love this method, and I don’t mind it either until I remember it is my job to teach my kids some life skills. That is where the second method comes in.

Some people use drugs, food, alcohol, Diet Coke, or sex to self medicate. I choose to clean and organize. And last night I needed to self medicate. So I started cleaning and organizing. I managed to talk my husband into joining me and we decided on a crazy idea: 45 days / 45 boxes

We spent our October Service Saturday raking leaves at my sister’s house. She had a baby about 6 weeks ago and we knew she could use some extra help with her tree-filled yard.

All parents need a toolbox of parenting tools. And we use the different tools for different situations. We have tools we save for special occasions and ones we pull out more often . My go-to parenting tool right now is humor.

Every once in awhile God throws us a bone and lets us know that, despite our occasional rants, screw-ups, bad reactions, and swear words, we are doing okay at the hardest job on earth. Yesterday was my bone.