{"id":173,"date":"2015-05-29T20:07:42","date_gmt":"2015-05-29T20:07:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.karen-gustafson.com\/?p=173"},"modified":"2015-05-29T20:07:42","modified_gmt":"2015-05-29T20:07:42","slug":"we-are-that-family","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.karen-gustafson.com\/?p=173","title":{"rendered":"We Are That Family"},"content":{"rendered":"

That moment when you realize you are that<\/em> family…..<\/p>\n

You know them… They seem to fly by the seat of their pants.\u00a0 They’re the ones who\u00a0run ten minutes behind; sneaking into meetings and events trying not to be noticed.\u00a0 But they are.\u00a0 They’re the ones who bring store bought goodies and try to pass them off as homemade.\u00a0 They’re the ones who miss parent teacher conferences because they put the notice somewhere they won’t forget, but somehow do.\u00a0 They’re the ones saying sorry a lot for turning in parent signed forms late and only after the teacher called several times.\u00a0 They’re the ones whose house has piles of stuff on various counters, shoes\u00a0mounded in the corner, and crumbs on the floor.<\/p>\n

The signs were all there, but the reality hit hard several nights ago at an awards ceremony for one of my sons.\u00a0 After a hectic afternoon of appointments and errands, we headed to the ceremony.\u00a0 We showed up just as they were about to begin and realized that all of us were very underdressed for the occasion.\u00a0 We found our way to some seats in the back hoping no one would really notice.\u00a0\u00a0But of course, that’s not\u00a0how it went. \u00a0My son made his way to his spot next to other kids who were dressed in their Sunday best while he was wearing the same jeans and t-shirt he wore to school.\u00a0 \u00a0As we took our seats we began to chuckle knowing that we had somehow missed some important information.\u00a0 That’s when my daughter said, ‘We are that family.’<\/p>\n

As I thought about that statement in the days to follow, I was surprised by the sense of freedom I felt.\u00a0 For years, I tried not to be that family.\u00a0 Even with a lot of small children, I tried to make it to\u00a0places on time, dressed appropriately with\u00a0homemade baked goods in hand.\u00a0 I thought that was the goal of being a good mom.\u00a0 After all, that’s what everyone else seemed to be trying to achieve.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0There were a lot of days that I failed, but I knew that just meant I needed to try harder and plan smarter.\u00a0 There came a day when I realized that not only could I not\u00a0keep it together, but I was tired of trying to live up to some standard that was unattainable.\u00a0 I was making myself and my kids crazy.\u00a0 So I decided to give myself some grace and some room to be messy.<\/p>\n

I try to keep the piles and clutter under control so that we don’t end up on Hoarders<\/em>, but I don’t obsess over them.\u00a0 I try to make sure that we are dressed appropriately for any event we go to, but know that sometimes just being dressed is a big accomplishment!\u00a0 I also try to bring homemade baked goods when asked because I like to bake, but I feel no shame when I need to use store bought goods instead.\u00a0 I try to be on time for appointments and events because it’s important to me, but I don’t panic or come undone when I’m late.<\/p>\n

I’m learning to let go of the shame and negative thoughts when I fall short. \u00a0I’m learning to apologize and ask for grace, accepting it when given.\u00a0 I’m learning to laugh when things don’t go the way I had hoped or planned, realizing that life is messy.\u00a0 And in the process, I find I give more grace and mercy to all those other families just trying to make it through the day.<\/p>\n

So yes,\u00a0we are that<\/em> family.\u00a0 We’re doing the best that we can.\u00a0 Sometimes we hit the mark and sometimes we fall short.\u00a0 I’m just glad we’re doing it together…<\/p>\n

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That moment when you realize you are that family….. You know them… They seem to fly by the seat of their pants.\u00a0 They’re the ones who\u00a0run ten minutes behind; sneaking into meetings and events trying not to be noticed.\u00a0 But … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-173","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.karen-gustafson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/173","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.karen-gustafson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.karen-gustafson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.karen-gustafson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.karen-gustafson.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=173"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/www.karen-gustafson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/173\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":176,"href":"http:\/\/www.karen-gustafson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/173\/revisions\/176"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.karen-gustafson.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=173"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.karen-gustafson.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=173"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.karen-gustafson.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=173"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}