Our goal is always a simple one: to put our family first and have no regrets.
Someone posted this picture on Facebook a few weeks back, and I loved it then, so I saved it. It spoke to me in that it seemed to describe how we as parents try to live our lives. Like most parents, we put our children first and the decisions we make focus strictly on what’s best for them and for the way that we wish to mold them and the foundations we wish to give them.
We know that this time is limited and that it’s important. They’re only “ours” for a short time before we must set them free, off into the world to make their way, making life’s choices using all the tools we’ve given them in their tool-kits. As parents, we’ve taught them the importance of eating together around the table and talking things out. We’ve taught them how to solve problems and come out stronger in the end, how to do more on less, how to be frugal, how to appreciate the little things in life as well as what we believe the big things in life should be. We’ve passed on our strong morals and values and we’ve taught them to think of others before themselves.
And now, as our oldest has transitioned into the next phase of her life: high school, we’re watching it all fall into place. We’re watching all of our hard work, time and effort pay off. As parents of a high school student, it’s our time now to step back a bit and watch our daughter use the tools in her tool-kit that we’ve helped her to stock over the years while we continue to help her fill it for the future.
It’s an amazing time, and yet it emphasizes the above quote to us even more. Our time with her in this capacity is short and we not only see the “light at the end of the tunnel,” but we actually see the end of the tunnel, we see our window of time together in this way, closing. As much as it saddens us to see her growing up, it thrills us to see her growing, maturing and becoming a confident, kind adult, the type of person we hoped we were raising and setting forth into the world.
It’s fulfilling to watch her make good choices (so far), to appreciate the things we’ve taught her to appreciate, to remember the talks around the dinner table and in the early after school hours as she makes some hard decisions, and to see her make good, solid, split decisions that put the needs of others before her own.
It’s nice to see it all coming together, to see the person we’ve molded, the foundation we’ve built coming into her own. We’re far from finished teaching her and our other children, that we know; our job’s not done, but it’s so nice to see the fruits of our labor coming to be and to see that it’s been worth all of the sacrifice, the time, effort and hard work that we’ve put into being parents, into raising and teaching our kids over anything else.
As the quote above says so well, we’ve found that time to be precious and to be a privilege, and we’re pleased to see that during this time of their lives, it’s precious and a privilege to our children as well, that they still look to us for the consistent advice and encouragement they’ve always relied on us for, and they still want to do the things together that we’ve always done as a family. They need us more now, as they’re getting older, than ever before.
It’ll be over in a blink and our nest will then be empty, but we’ll be able to be proud as we watch the adults we’ve raised from birth go into the world.
The Whole bag of Chips 
Now that all three of ours are in college, I know you’re right – seeing them living positive, successful lives and making good decisions makes it a lot easier to let them go. But oh, it’s still so hard…I miss them SO much. -Amy at http://www.momgoeson.wordpress.com
I told someone today, I teeter between bursting with pride as I watch them and wanting to burst into tears as I watch them. I appreciate your perspective a lot! Thanks as always, for reading. 🙂
What a beautiful message and beautiful reminder. Mine are still so young: 3 and 1. I know how quickly it really is going to go by though.
Sasha- It sounds so cliche to tell you to “enjoy every minute,” and that “it goes by so fast,” but do, because it does. Thanks for reading and for commenting!