Recipe for getting out of a really rotten "funk"

Have you heard of the children's book titled Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day? Well, all you have to do is change "Alexander" to "LaRae" and you will know what my day was like a week ago Friday. It's been over a week since that "very bad day", so I guess it's far enough behind me that I can bring myself to talk about it now. It's not that anything earth-shatteringly horrible happened that day. There are a million things that could have happened to make it a much worse day. But still, it was a bad day - your run-of-the-mill really rotten day. It started out decent enough, but by about noon, there was no doubt that this was destined to be a bummer of a day.

The culprit that created this no good day was the big "C" word - contention. I felt like there was a little cloud of contention raining on my house all day long, and it was a very persistent little cloud. Our school had the day off, so my kids were home all day. They apparently didn't know what to do with themselves, so they fought & bickered endlessly. If they weren't fighting with each other, they were fighting with me (and yes, there were times that I fought back!). It was a day that seemed to go on forever and was full of time-outs, threats, consequences, and more fun stuff. On days like this, I feel like I am failing to teach my children such things as -

And ye will not suffer your children that they go hungry, or naked; neither will ye suffer that they transgress the laws of God, and fight and quarrel one with another, and serve the devil, who is the master of sin, or who is the devil spirit which hath been spoken of by our fathers, he being an enemy to all righteousness. (Mosiah 4:14)

How am I supposed to teach this? I have not figured it out. When I ask my girls how they would suggest I teach this to them, they just tell me, "we're kids and we're supposed to fight." Who told them that? {Can you say "deja vu"? There was a day when I was them & my mom was me! Things don't change all that much, do they?}

Anyway - by the time Brad got home on this very bad day, he found me in a really rotten "funk". It went from bad to worse because when mom's not happy, dad is definitely not happy! By the time the kids went to bed, every girl, including me, had shed an abundance of tears & we were all more than glad to leave this day behind. We were happy to be able to wake up the next morning & start over. (what a blessing this is, really!)

Now, I have been told many times that if you want to forget your own troubles, do something for someone else (& I think for moms, that "someone else" needs to be someone other than your kids - because we do things for them all the time). Anyway - we were very fortunate that our rotten day came on the eve of a stake-planned day of community service with the church. Members of our stake had signed up to perform various acts of service throughout the community during Saturday morning. So, the Wallaces all got up bright & early to be to my former elementary school by 8:00 am to help work in their garden. I put on my yellow shirt & Madi decided that we should all wear yellow shirts.

Look how cute we are spreading our sunshine - thankfully the little cloud of contention dissipated!

There was much work to be done in this garden. It is amazing to see the amount of land that the older elementary schools in the valley are built on - definitely in a day when land was not at a premium. We had the opportunity to help create an area in the garden that was accessible to children in wheelchairs. We also pulled weeds for hours. Though weed-pulling may sound like drudgery, it was actually much-needed therapy for our family. It was the recipe for washing away the feelings from the day before. How rewarding it was to work together to create something worthwhile for someone else.

It is absolutely true that when you are engaged in service, that is the only thing you think about. There was not a moment when I was pulling weeds that I thought about how I am failing to teach my children how to get along. And you know what, there wasn't one moment that my girls fought with each other while they were working in the garden. They look like they are cooperating together right here, don't they!

I especially enjoyed being on the grounds of my former school. My girls were amazed that the school was still standing & in operation - after all, it is REALLY old!

I am so thankful for the really great, productive, energy-filled day that followed my terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day. If you ever need to get out of a funk like I did, think about what you can do for someone else. I know I will the next time I have a rotten day. In fact, if my kids have a day of fighting like the one I just told you about, I think I will load them in the car & drive around until we find someone who needs our help! That would certainly be better than letting the little cloud of contention rain on us all day!