It's OK to cry

Sunday we all piled in our Envoy (filled with gas for those of you worried about previous excursions!) We picked up Drew and Ellie from the airport. They were coming from doing all the music for Young Life at the camp, Crooked Creek. They had just a little time to do a few things before driving to another Young Life camp, Windy Gap to be continuing with music.

We had an hour and a half with them before saying good-bye. As we drove off and gave our final waves. Ro and Essie began arguing over having the music on or off. (I am not going to tell you who I wanted to side with, although I will tell you that the WEE SING CD has 62 Bible songs!) I caught myself getting irritated with Ro with how she was responding and realizing that I was irritated bc I don't like saying good-bye. I was trying to explain to her what compromising was when she just said, "Mommy, I want to go home." I told her that our new home was in Panama and we weren't there yet. She responded telling me that she did not want to go to Panama, she wanted to go to our house. I explained to her that in the same way that she sold her toys at our garage sale for others to enjoy, that mommy and daddy did the same with our home. I explained that it was very hard to do and some days I wish I hadn't given my house away but that I knew that the Lord has a special blessing for us for being obedient even when its hard to obey. She continued to get angry and then I realized that it wasn't the house she was sad about, it was that we were saying goodbye to Uncle Drew and Aunt Ellie.

I asked her if she was sad because we said goodbye to them and she nodded. I told her that it was OK to be sad. It was OK to cry. At this point she burst into tears and had her fingers in her mouth trying to hold back her sobs. I gave her a Chic Fil A napkin and she wiped away her tears and continued to cry for a few minutes and eventually pulled herself together.

I told her, "Mommy knows exactly how you feel."