Sometimes When We are Teaching Our Kids...

...They are also teaching us.

We had one of those experiences in our house this month.

I signed Sam up for Little League machine pitch baseball this fall so he could really learn how to play.  Our experience with baseball has been minimal so I thought fall ball might be good exposure to the game.  My visions of Sunday afternoon games followed by celebratory ice cream turned out to be episodes of frustration that ended in weekly tears.  Sam is the smallest and youngest kid on the team with the least baseball experience.

After 3 weeks of leaving the game with a child in tears because he couldn't hit the ball, I was ready to call it quits.  My mother heart could not bear to see my baby so sad and because of something I encouraged him to do!  Every time I wanted to say "let's call it quits," my gut would stop me.

So Trent took him to the batting cages and started working with him.  Then came another Sunday and he struck out again.   It was so hard seeing him that frustrated and sad.  Then came game #5 and guess what happened.  My boy got a hit! The entire bleachers for our team started yelling because these parents had watched with us for 4 weeks as Sam walked away from home plate with his head in his hands.  So rightfully so they celebrated with us when he got a hit.

It was so cute.  He jumped up and down with his hands in the air when he got to first base and then to top it off, the coach gave him the game ball for his achievement.  Something changed that day.  My seemingly defeated child learned that hard things are worth working for and that the joy in the moment of achievement often erases the memories of weeks of disappointment.

We have had 2 more games since then and he has had multiple hits in each of them.  Sam learned the value of hard work this season and I learned something too.  Sometimes my mother heart wants to hover over my kids and pull them out of hard situations so they don't get hurt.  But if I do, I rob them of a very valuable lesson that God may be trying to teach them to prepare them for life away from me.

Oh parenting is so hard but yet so rewarding.