My #MothersPromise

This post is in partnership with #Pampers & #Walmart via #Acorn. All opinions and content are mine alone.

I used to be “that guy” who said a lot of things before I became a mom. Things like, “I’ll never be the mom who let’s her kid sleep in her bed.” Or “I’ll never be the mom who buys her kid character Crocs.” Or “I’ll never be the mom who feeds her kids frozen chicken nuggets.” Or “I’ll be the mom who has the perfect, drug-free, natural birth.” (We all know how that ended…)

I have taken all of those statements back (and then some). 

I was naive. Dare I say, immature and ignorant. And that’s okay. It’s called learning from our mistakes.

If I’ve learned ANYTHING from parenting (and TRUST ME, I do not claim to be a know-it-all mom… in fact, I feel like I’m the opposite), I’ve learned that parenting is a whole lot of trial and error. It’s a whole lot of guessing. It’s a whole lot of “throwing stuff at a wall and seeing what sticks,” if you know what I mean.

Being a mom has been the best, most rewarding, most challenging, most back-breaking, most gut-wrenching, most enjoyable, most difficult, most hilarious, most tiresome, most unbelievably stressful, most encouraging, most fun, most loving job I’ve ever had.

I’m not going to lie though… adding a second baby has, well, kicked me in the rear. It’s tough. And I’m tired exhausted. But I wouldn’t change it for the world.

The last few weeks since we welcomed Amos into our family have been some of the toughest I’ve ever experienced. Don’t get me wrong, Amos is awesome and he’s a pretty easygoing baby. But there’s just something about juggling TWO kids that has thrown me for a loop. And I’ve had a lot of days (okay, most days) where I get to the end of the day and I think about all the parenting #fails I had that day and I think about all the things I wish I had done differently.

But, I realize a lot of it stems from emotions. I realize a lot of it is just me trying to navigate my way through a very new (and very different) reality. It’s one that comes with extreme highs and extreme lows. And the more I give myself a hard time and the more I let society or a blog post or a HuffPost Parents article tell me all that I’m “doing wrong” – the more in my own head I get. And I have realized that I’ve got to cut that out.

I’ve got to STOP letting the outside world (and my innermost demons) tell me all I’m doing wrong. 

I am not a perfect parent. I am not a perfect mother. But I do love my children more than words will ever, ever, ever be able to express. I don’t know what I’m doing half the time.

As my husband recently said, “Parenting is a lot like politics: it’s making a lot of vague promises in the hopes that it sounds like you know what you’re talking about.” 

I can promise a lot of things to my kids – but there’s really only one promise I know that I can truly, WITHOUT QUESTION keep – and that is to love both of them with every fiber of my being and promise that there will never, ever be a day in their lives where they don’t know that their mommy loves them. 

I will do the best I can to give them the best life, teach them how to be selfless, strong, and independent people. I will do the best I can to give them a good education, a safe place to live, food in their bellies. I will do the best I can to expose them to a variety of activities and give them chances to fail and succeed. I will do the best I can to teach them about the highs and lows of life. I will do the best I can to teach them about loving and serving others.

But most of all, I promise to love them.

And especially in these early days (the newborn stage can be tough! And the toddler years? WHEW. It’s a doozy, y’all…) sometimes I have to celebrate success like keeping my kids alive, fed, clothed, and in clean diapers.

You guys know that we cloth diaper in our house and we plan to continue with Amos. However, Amos was pretty teeny when he was born so he STILL (at almost 6 weeks old) doesn’t fit in 99% of the cloth diapers we own, so we’ve been using disposables on him until he fits in our cloth stash.

Plus, we have always used disposables when we travel (just a whole lot more convenient), at church, when Lilly’s at school, and sometimes when we are out and about. So, just because we cloth diaper most of the time, doesn’t mean we don’t use disposables ever.

But, because we love cloth so much, I am pretty picky about the kind of disposables I use on my kiddos.

It’s not like I’d never heard of Pampers before (I mean, they’ve been a staple of moms for generations), but I was first exposed to them in the hospital with Lilly! Our hospital exclusively uses Pampers Premium Care and I love that they are so high quality, I love that they are hypoallergenic and gentle on baby’s bum, and the wetness indicator (aka: the yellow line that turns blue when they’re wet making it easy to tell if they need a change), make them a favorite for me.

We got the HUGE box from Walmart for Amos because, let’s be honest… newborns go through A LOT of diapers! So, you know, we will go through this box in like 3 days, right? Exaggeration… 🙂 You know what I mean! 🙂 

I love this pic of Amos taken in the hospital hours after he was born. My sweet, tiny boy. <3

Sometimes it’s the little things, like the newborn smell, or a freshly bathed baby, or a smile from your kiddo, or a baby running around in a diaper (the cutest, right?), to remind us that we don’t need to “do it all” to be a good parent. We just need to love our kiddos.

While I know there aren’t a lot of things that I do well, loving my kids and letting them know how much they are loved is one thing I’ve nailed. And, on the really hard days or the days where I wonder if I’m really cut out for this whole “Mom” thing, I have to simply remember… my kids know I love them… let’s call that a win.

That’s my #motherspromise.

What about you? What is YOUR #motherspromise?