Not all heroes wear capes, not all angels have wings.....

In our household super heroes pretty much rule the day.  They are on our TV, on our video games, on our costumes and on our heart.  If you ask my 4 year old what he wants to be when he grows up.  No less then 2 seconds he will likely tell you Captain America or any of the Marvel Crew. They seem like such giants in the mind of a child. To save the day, to save a life man the expectations are set high.

I suppose I remember those days. Those days I aspired to be running with the Giants, the heroes with those flashy capes.  Then it came the cute teenager with the microphone and screaming fans.  Then the business lady with briefcase, flawless figure and 6 inch heels. The expectations and bar was never set high enough.

Today how ironic as I sit here, never living up to any of those expectations how different my view of  my super heroes are.  They aren't flashy at all.  They aren't famous.  They aren't saving lives.  Most of them don't even wear heels anymore period.  My heroes come in the form of running attire (even if they don't workout a day in their life), mini vans and popsicle stains.  Their entourage range from ages 2-10 and their capes well who the hell has time for capes. We are too busy with school pickup, soccer games and diaper changes.

I used to feel less of a person for not saving the world.  Now I know we are the ones to save the world.  The way we raise our children.  The way we instill our faith. The way we pray each and everyday for our friends, our kids and our husbands. In fact, I challenge Captain America to a quest. Try chasing a runaway 3 year old, while bouncing a toddler on your hip, all the while unloading a car full of groceries and we will see who wins that battle. These girls!!!

We are strong, we are resourceful. We are smart and brave.  We show up for our kids, we come running for our friends, we can even survive half a lifetime on 4 hours of sleep. Truth.  We know how to survive the big things.  Illness, tragedy, heartbreak.  We know also how to humbly accept blessing. We finally get there is someone bigger then us, someone we can never attain to be.  The ultimate super hero of our lives.

So this weekend we all will celebrate those superheroes in our lives.  Our Mamas.  The beautiful mighty warriors that raised us. Our friends the angels without wings, who fly along with us.  The super hero in ourselves.  As I sit after one of my biggest battles yet, I am surround with many images in the form of food, cards, flowers and gifts.  Messages and love. All reminding me each second to remember.  Not only do not all super heroes wear capes, not all angels wear wings.

Happy Mothers Day my amazing warriors.  We are doing hard things!

Good Girl.....

I a good girl Mommy.  5 little words that caused me to stop dead in my tracks.  What one would think would make a heart melt, it made mine stone cold that cold fall morning.  As I looked at her, the expression on her big blue eyes told everything. Although not one of her features even to her toes resemble anything but her Father, her insides reek that Good Girl so many years ago. 

If I've learned anything through my struggles of adolescence and post partum it is this.  I have the good girl disease. The days aren't exhausting because of the task before me, they are exhausting because of the unending work within my soul.  The desire to please, the desire to be liked and the desire to be good.

That desire to be good, turned into an addiction to perfection.  Constantly urning to be more, do more which never really filled the holy holes in my soul.  A Mothers fear took over.  You know that fear that if the DNA I pass down of cancer, lack of comprehension or impatience wasn't enough.  Please Lord don't let me turn this little angel into a basket case like me.

So I did what every Mom would do.....I got out candy, I got out my brightest red lipstick and I said go to town.....Even though my daughter looked like a sugared up mass murderer that morning it somehow soothed my soul.  I never want her to think perfection is attainable or being good is something she must do for anyONE.  She must find a way to find that good enough that fills her soul to the finish line.

Motherhood has actually been highly therapeutic and more like shock therapy for my good girl disease.  Each and everyday over and over it reminds me how imperfect I am and no where good enough to do this job.  By the Grace of God I continue to learn and accept the word fail as more of love language then a curse.

To you good girls out there lets all raise our hands and repeat after me:

Grace makes me Good Enough.....Forgiveness makes me free and Love makes me whole.

 

 

 

He is Able......

I had one of the most exciting times of my life this weekend. I worshiped, prayed and sobbed with 6,000 women.  Sounds frightening to some... all that estrogen in one room.  To me it lifted some of the deepest baggage I have ever worn.  In three words "I'm not alone" freedom came and it came in a big way.

I looked around and saw so many different women.  Sizes, shapes, ethnicities crying out ME TOO!!!! Not just me too, that they too had so much baggage to bear, but also at the same time how many blessings has still been rained down upon them.  I'm not sure Hope could have escaped that stadium if it wanted to.

Priscilla Shirer, if you ever get to hear her please do, kept reciting a passage that if we never know our God or pick up the bible we can lay our hands on and believe.  It comes in the form of Ephesians 3:20 it states:

 Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us.

I kept replaying those words.  Now- this moment.  Is able, to do not just more, immeasurably more. In our lives and guess what his power to do these things lives in us.

Girls let me tell you we all have a story.  We can all tell of his great Grace at some point in our lives or we surely will.  I can also tell you this its always more, always grand, always dynamic. More then our wants, prayers and dreams could ever take us.

Two times in my life that have been incredibly painful and I believed with all my heart he proved this to me.  When I lost the love of my life  two months before my wedding and when cancer proved it kinda liked me and diminished my chances at a young age to have children.

Not only did God reward me in double for those dark, desperate times of hurt in my life....he lavishly rewarded me in double.  I not only have faithful love in my life, our meeting was nothing mundane.  Atlanta Georgia, random introduction across the way, live 5 minutes away back home and a feeling in that first hug outside that stadium God said this is what it all was for.  He is good. He is from me.  My husband is a contstant reminder of God's immeasurable power.

Fast forward few years later. Not only did God take the hands of amazing surgeons to answer my prayers of delivering a child, I was rewarded the most perfect baby boy.  Then just to top off his grace and love he gave me another child nothing short of boring, guess what? Happens to be a baby girl. One of each for me to adore in his glory. Tell the world he seemed to scream. I have overcome it all and I will for you.

Girls he is able.  I'm not sure what you are facing today.  We all are facing something, but this I know keep praying, keep believing.  He can, He is able and when he does it will be immeasurably more then you could have ever imagined.  That I will promise you.

1,000 Reasons to Smile

"I love when you do that Mom! You know when you smile."

The words hit me like daggers today laying, snuggling with my 4 year old son.  The look of peace staring at me was eye opening.  He knew I was happy, he wanted me to be happy.  Was he on the fact that some days I'm anything but....you know Moms what I mean.  Those days when the monotony and carpool catches up and there is nothing you want more then a big break.

Wait! Did he not see the smiles I had when he comforted the crying baby, or made his first soccer goals?  When he spotted an american flag after school and rambled off 1-20 so perfect.  Or when he always gives Jesus praise for making him super fast or funny, so so funny. 

Is it the days I yell too much for picking on his sister.  Or not hurrying up, just like his Mama who seems to rush through life.  Or when he just won't fall asleep to take his naps anymore, I'm not ready for that darn it...remember I need the break.

It dawned on me today that life is passing by.  That 4 year old on the couch, kinda loves me...idolizes me actually. That one day this is what he will remember.  Not how many toys I purchased, or trips to the zoo. Not the play dates or trips to the pool.  It is this, that smile on my face that will forever mark his heart. That will make him want to come back to visit. That he will inherit one day.

So I challenged myself today that instead of doing the 30 day skinny challenge, the get organized challenge, the make time for me challenge....that I would challenge myself to the greatest one of all.  The smile challenge.

It once was said......

 

 

I believe that.  Guess What? Our kids do too:)

Am I Pitty?

 

So the school year beginning bell has rung for the Zimmers.  I'm going to come out first and say not one tear was shed by anyone but my daughter.  She had more then any one of us could have ever combined on a bad day.  I kept looking around, doing the actress tear up deal.....lets just say I can understand why Hollywood never called. I skeptically looked around for some comrades.  I think I spotted a few but never can be sure.

Something surreal happened that morning that trumped any of that.  It happened and it happened young.  My two year old daughter discovered a mirror that was laid against the wall to be hung in  her brothers room.  I witnessed the walk up. The grab of the dress on both sides.  The sway and the look up.  Then it happened.  "Am I pitty Mom?"

Double Take, holy crap....did she seriously already discover beauty was a question. I wanted to scream no not yet!!! I wanted to grab her chubby little bootiful face and kiss it hundred thirty times.  I wanted in that instant to provide her so much assurance that it would last a lifetimes of those hideous questions.

Does she secretly know the truth.  That she was headed to that place.  That "school" place where cruelness and vulnerability starts.  Where kids eventually will notice labels, pimples and all sorts of akward.  Will they make fun of her name, her smile as she squints those adorable eyes and bunches up that nose.  Will they notice that, my favorite thing about her and have her believe anything but. 

That place where she stands in the open praying someone befriends her.  Someone finds acceptance for her, someone wants to be her friend because of her heart and not her outward beauty.  Then it dawned on me how many parents are feeling the same thing.  As they hug and turn to walk away to silence, some peace.... do they have that little piece of empty in their stomachs?

I pray a lot, but I'm not sure I could ever pray more over something in my entire spiritual journey.  That God surrounds my kids with good loving nurture. That the scary place, is also filled with angels who surround them.  Waiting to bring out the strength and faith they need to withstand a cold and tarnished world.

God says in the good book by my bed, in fact every bed in my house in case of daily emergency or hiding....!   Hebrews 11:1 - 11:40 Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.  Proverbs 22:6 Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it.  I have faith in his word, that no matter how akward, struggling, or denied at times they may be they are protected, even in my absence.  They find that place in their wee little souls that reminds them they are loved. They are accepted.  They are safe.

And we all say Amen....especially because school has begun and these angels can help a Mother out:)