I’ll never forget my dad’s advice to me as a young mom when my kids were driving me crazy. “Pam,” he’d say in his wise way of speaking, “you’ll just have to find a way to outsmart them.”
My response was always the same: “Dad, it’s hard to outsmart kids smarter than me.”

I enjoy that memory so much—especially now as I watch my grandkids outsmart their own parents. And I’m happy to remind my children how they need to learn to outsmart those smart grandchildren of mine.

My Mother’s Day FaceTime

Both of my children live on the other side of the country and FaceTime has become my lifeline. So when on Mother’s Day I got that special call I get every year on this special day, I immediately saw that my father’s wise counsel that I had graciously shared with them hadn’t helped.

Will looked frazzled and sounded anxious as soon as I answered the call and when he told me his story I understood why. His two daughters—Finley is four and Reilly is two—woke up at 5:30 am that morning, an hour earlier than usual. Their plan was to help their dad make breakfast for mom, but things didn’t work out the way they planned.

Things went well at the beginning. Finley went outside to pick flowers for the breakfast tray while her dad started cooking. But when she came back inside, everything went bonkers.

First rule of feeding kids: don’t take your eyes off of them

Will, rushing around the kitchen enough to work up a sweat, poured her a glass of milk between beating the eggs and starting the toast but then committed the first cardinal principle of feeding kids: never take your eyes off them. And in an instant, Finley spilled the milk all over the floor. With one hand on the skillet and one eye on the toaster, Will had to get her wiped down, the floor wiped up and his brow wiped off.

That was just the beginning of Will’s Mother’s Day purgatory. The second cardinal principle of feeding kids is that when one bad thing happens, others soon follows.
So as soon as Reilly saw that her big sister’s crisis was settled, she chose to cause her own and had one of those potty training accidents.

Both girls were wailing. The floor was sticky. The toast was burning. The eggs were stuck to the pan. And Will was rushing around like a one-armed wallpaper hanger trying to keep everything under control enough to keep their mom from waking up.

I nodded sympathetically as he poured out his story. But I couldn’t help thinking, What goes around comes around.

My daughter Katie made her Mother’s Day call a little later and while the details changed, the story stayed the same.

Her husband Vic made breakfast earlier that morning. His plan, like that of every husband was to help their two daughters make breakfast while mom slept in on her special day.

Like their cousins who are roughly the same age, the two sisters got up earlier than normal with plans to join their dad in the kitchen. But Brynn—the youngest—had a different idea. While Lydia did what she was supposed to do, Brynn went straight to her mom’s bedroom, where her mom was blissfully asleep, and dove straight in. “I wanna snuggle,” she said.

No restful morning for mom

Princess Jasmine—their cat—figured since everyone was jumping in the pool, she might as well dive in, too. So she jumped up on Katie’s stomach. So much for a restful morning for mom.

Katie threw the covers back, jumped from her bed, took Princess Jasmine and marched to her to the living room. Elsa—their rescue dog with an uncertain lineage but a dandy voice—met them there and with one look at Princess Jasmine began howling.

I couldn’t quite understand what happened next but apparently Lydia decided enough was enough and left the kitchen to her dad to join the others and restore order. So when Katie finally called me, both girls were in her bed and giddy-upping on her back as if she was a horse.

Katie stopped her story long enough to ask me, “What am I going to do with them?”

“Find a way to outsmart them,” I said, hoping she had better luck with that advice than I had.

It all made me so happy. All my family are healthy, and have a wonderful life. The only drawback is Mike and I aren’t with them. Maybe one day.

Look closely enough at your loved ones to see God’s grace at work

Sound familiar? Through the frustrations that all parents and grandparents go through, we need to remember to stop and look closely at our loved ones. Do you really see them, do you see the ultimate grace of God that is poured in and through them?

It’s so awesome to realize how God cares for the laughter, the spilled milk, the sore muscles, the cats and dogs howling and all the other frustrations and messes of our lives.

So let us come boldly to the throne of our gracious God. There we will receive his mercy, and we will find grace to help us when we need it most. Hebrews 4:16