Potty training and comparisons

Last night I commented to Matt that potty training was exhausting. I literally felt tethered to the potty chair. I was afraid to leave the room for more than a minute. My house, which has been undergoing a good cleaning this week, at least up until yesterday, was a wreck last night. This morning found us at homeschooling group lessons. This is a seasonal event where on fridays, we can sign our children up for age appropriate classes. They (our kids) are out of the house socializing, doing fun science (or other) experiments, and I get to mingle with other homeschool parents. Because of this, Noah was in a diaper all morning. When we returned home, it was time for lunch, then nap. Tonight we will spend 4 to 5 hours running the coffeehouse at our church. We bring our kids along. They think its great fun and beg to come. They especially like the shakes and smoothies we make for them. Once again, Noah will be in a diaper. The good news is that I have plans to be home allllllll day tomorrow....I LOVE that! Nothing is more frustrating than having a saturday filled with obligations, especially boring ones. Tomorrow, Matt and I hope to do the bulk of our bathroom renovations that we started back in June. That story, my friends, is a whole other post! That means that Noah can be in underpants and back to training again.

I was thinking this morning, as I sat looking around at the other homeschool parents. I was thinking about how I have a really bad habit of comparing myself to others. I think its mostly bad for me, in that I often come out feeling like I'm holding the short end of the stick. Why do we do this to ourselves? Is it our personality? Is it insecurity? I think probably a little of both. Most of my comparisons tend to be with others in similar situations as myself. "She has two kids, just like I do, and her house is sooooo clean you could eat of the floor." I have to remind myself that not everything is at is seems on the surface. Some of my friends have help sometimes with a professional cleaner. That is actually what I do every other weekend for a family, thereby subtracting those precious hours from my house and family. I also have friends who have decided that in this season of their life that they are not able to really volunteer or commit to anything more than sunday AM attendance at their church. Being that we attend a smaller church, which forces everyone to wear a variety of "hats" so to speak, I work plenty at church. It also makes a difference that the head pastor is my father, and that one of the associate pastors is my husband. Do you ever feel as if your time is not truly your own? Well, it really isn't....it belongs to God but he gives us choices to make in how we spend it.

Do you do this to yourself? I know I cannot be the only one. I know its not how God judges me. I know he isn't holding me up to the measuring stick of everyone else. I think the only way I can stop this is to make a true effort to recognize it when I do it, and put a stop to it. I have to remember that I am "fearfully and wonderfully made". If God feels that way about me, even knowing I have sticky orange juice spills on my tile floor and crumbs stuck in the folds of my sofa slipcovers, then who am I to question him?