Motherhood is doing hard things, so our children will have great memories

The day-to-day tasks that are involved with being ‘mom’ are hard. Raising a tiny human to be a good person is even harder. It’s all hard. Taking care of and entertaining the kids all day can be absolutely exhausting.

And one of the hardest tasks I have found as a mom-of-two is actually leaving the house. It can be intimidating and stressful.

Will my 3-year-old throw a tantrum in the middle of the store? Will my 6-month-old cry for an hour straight while we are running errands? How on earth am I going to fit my groceries in the shopping cart with two kids already in it?

And those are just the necessary errands.

What about those unnecessary trips that are hard and really push the limits of your patience, but you do them anyway?

The ones that we do because we want our kids to have good experiences and great memories. We want them to learn. We want them to have fun even if it makes us want to scream out loud or go sit in a corner and cry.

Why do we do it? Because when you are a mom, you do things that are hard. You forge ahead and do what you think is best for your tiny humans.

Like these three things that I consistently do for my kiddos, even though they make me a little flustered even just thinking about them.

1. Family vacations

Each summer, my family takes a trip to Hilton Head. I can’t lie—it is not easy. We pack up our car with more suitcases, highchairs, beach toys, and diapers than you could imagine. With a boisterous 3-year-old, an infant and a 10-hour drive, let’s just say my patience is tested.

But my husband and I do it every year because we love our children, want to spend quality time with them away from home and we want them to have fun memories of playing on the beach. Even though I don’t really like sand, I play in it and build sand castles and let my 3-year-old bury me. Because it brings him so much joy, it brings me even more joy.

2. Church

Almost every Sunday, we go to church. Almost every Sunday, my husband and I spend the entire hour attempting to get our child to whisper, keeping him from sneaking under the pew to touch the shoes of the person in front of us, or making a crazy catch as he launches a Potato Head through the air towards an innocent bystander. I feel like I can’t even pay attention and wonder if the people attending without kids really just want us to leave.

But after the service every week, people come up to us and tell us how much they love seeing the kids in church. And how they really miss the days when they were chasing toddlers through a maze of pews. So we keep going, because it’s important to us that our children learn about their faith, and I guess it’s entertaining to the rest of the church-goers.

3. Paw Patrol Live

OMG, this one was a doozy. When our son Henry was two, his love for Paw Patrol was equal to his love for running in circles and potato chips. (AKA his love was STRONG.) So, we bought him tickets to see Paw Patrol Live. The minute we walked in, we were bombarded by ALL THE MERCHANDISE. I refused to pay $48 for a t-shirt that I could get at Target for $10 so I negotiated with a huge bag of kettle corn.

We went inside the theater and settled in. Kind of. Henry was restless. When was it starting? Where was the Paw Patroller? Why do the members of Paw Patrol wear clothes and our dog Newman is naked? ?

Finally, the show started. He was absolutely enchanted.When it finally ended, Henry could not stop talking about it. He was absolutely overjoyed. So, I was happy too. Side note: To the people who put on this production, whoever plays Mayor Goodway deserves a raise. A+ performance.

So for the next 17 or so years, I will continue to do things that stress me out, intimidate me, or even bore me. Because I love my kids. And I’m a mom. And moms do hard things.