It's a new year

Advent always makes me think of where I'm at to meet Jesus and where I want to improve. A lot of it was spent praying for peace and to try to let go of the things I cannot change that I try to in my sense of false control I so badly want to have. I think it went well and really it helped me to find a little bit of Jesus amongst the chaos.

Today at mass, our priest challenged us to be more Mary. In her life most of it out of her control she was able to have peace and patience. These things seem to be so difficult as a parent of small children. The children are crazy and can constantly test your patience so you give them anything they want instead of what you and they need.

My job as a parent is to equip my children with the tools to get to heaven. To stay on that narrow path to and with Jesus. And it's hard already and I don't even have anyone over the age of three my charge. To really try to teach them to love above all else, sometimes is hard and I know I fail at it a lot. But I'm realizing that I may be putting too much weight on my shoulders and not letting God do his thing.

And so in this new year I'm going to try to love more and worry less, To try to get rid of some of my false sense of control, and in doing so try to get closer to Mama Mary. After almost 7 years of being Catholic, I admit I still struggle with all things Marian, and to this point I've gotten her intellectually. But this year I want to try to work on my relationship with her and get to know her mama to mama. Because with a new baby set to arrive in about 9 weeks on top of the 2 littles I'm trying to already take care of and teach it's going to be an interesting year.

So my prayer and resolution this year is to get to know mama Mary and by doing so get to know her son Jesus even better. I hope I can really do this because the peace and patience of Christ, I really do need them.