Does it ever amaze you when your child speaks truth to you because you either didn’t expect them to see it so clearly, or you actually hadn’t looked the truth in the face yourself?
I had one of those moments today. You will laugh, because it’s a pretty funny story and one I think we can likely all relate to. It has to do with putting your best foot forward. Or something.
I had a photo shoot scheduled today for 2pm. I chose that time because I knew I could get Ella to nap before then, and the boys occupied with a movie while I worked with the clients. Stuart had an all day training today so he couldn’t be here to ride herd. Well, my studio has been trashed… seriously… for awhile now. I’ve been slowly working through the piles through the week. Since I do mostly location shoots, I haven’t kept it a priority to be in photo-shoot condition. And it’s a room in the house where when people come over, I simply shut the door. 😉 You have rooms like that right?
Well, I made pretty good progress on the studio this week. It was ready to be used even if it wasn’t completely and totally organized. However, there was still some stuff that needed to be put away and such, that I was going to do last minute today. And I like to have the rest of the house presentable when clients or friends come over as well. But since I was alone with the kids today I knew that the best time for getting that done was after I put Ella down, for that hour before the shoot was scheduled.
I fed the kids lunch today and we had just wrapped that part of things up. Fortunately I had the lads clean up their “tents” that destroyed the entire living room before lunch, because at 12:30 and hour and a half early my clients arrived!!! WHAT?!? My problem out here is usually that they don’t seem to be able to make it on time, but this was a completely new predicament.
Myself and a stinky Ella answered the door. I told them that I needed to get her into bed and I’d be right with them. So as I was changing Ella and getting her juice, I was firing off commands for the boys to “pick that up” “put that away” and such till Qade looked at me and said, “Because we want them to think our house is always clean?”
I laughed out loud at that and right away relaxed a little. Yes, I’d like it if our house was always “show” ready, but no, that’s not reality. And even though I will always try and “clean up” before company and clients arrive, I also need to remember that being real is more important that always having your best foot forward.
We’ve been talking to our boys lately about honesty. Because we want to cultivate a spirit of honesty in our home. We want them to be able to talk to us about things that are going on with them, even if they aren’t necessarily “good” things. And today in that one little gad flash of understanding from my 5 year old, I had a good reminder to be honest as well.