Good parenting award..haha

Well it all started on Saturday...

 Mom and I took the girls shopping for the day to get Sophia some clothes for summer. We were walking through Kohls looking at clothes and the kids started to get a little agitated. It was lunch time and they were also tired because we stayed up late the night before watching Yogi Bear. I guess I didn't really notice but some lady had been watching me as I shopped. Sophia was getting whiny and I had to get stern with her, then Olivia started to cry so I took her out of the cart, held her and put Sophia in the cart. We started to walk away from the children's clothes to go take a quick look at the shoes, before we went to get ice cream.

 Then I felt a tap on my shoulder with an excuse me miss. I figured my kids must have dropped something. The lady went on to thank me for keeping calm with my children and showing good parenting in the community. She then passed me this white envelope and said she would like to give me an award. I kindly said thank you and she walked away. I guessed it was just someone wanting to get info out about some parents group or something. When we got to the car I opened the envelope and looked at the stuff inside. There was a free one day pass to the "Y", someones email I was supposed to contact so they could put my name in the paper, and an invite to a dinner. Great starts put people out into the community to watch for adults who show good parenting with their children. I was kind of proud of myself, yeah it's not like it was anything big but lately I have really been under attack by some people telling me I'm not a good parent or I don't handle my daughter right and she is out of control. This really lifted my spirits to have a stranger think I was doing a good job with my kids.

 The sad thing is some of my friends made fun of me about this. Instead of being happy for me they acted like it was just a big joke or saying "well I should get one too, I'm a great parent", or "Oh look the mother of the year is talking to me I feel so lucky"....really hurt my feelings.

But like my mom said, "God gave you these children because he knew you and Jeremy would be the best parents for these girls and the best at raising them, that's why He didn't give you someone else's kids....He gave you yours"

Even If this "award" is just them trying to get more parents to join Great Starts, God knows when you need a little uplifting and He sent it at the right time, from a complete stranger.