Just finished reading this week's chapter in preparation for our Mom's Discussion Group this evening and want to share a bit with you from The Mission of Motherhood: Touching Your Child's Heart for Eternity by Sally Clarkson. I can say from my own experience as a mother that Sally's assessment of the opportunities for stay-at-home moms and their children far outweigh the call to career.
If a woman chooses to stay at home with her children, she has the opportunity of nursing her baby in peacefulness of her own home, caressing her precious little one, singing sweet lullabies to comfort and please the child's deepest emotional desires. She can offer them the restfulness of long, quiet naps in their own bedrooms. She has time to enrich the home environment with beautiful sights and smells--from aromas of homemade soup bubbling on the stove to the beautiful pictures in books--and arrange outings that foster budding intellects and awaken curiosity. And she has the flexibility to change her schedule to respond to teachable moments--those times when children's natural curiosity leads them to question and learn.
Best of all, when a mother chooses to stay home, she has the time and opportunity to craft the kind of relationship with her young children that only extended time together can foster. And from such a relationship she has a much better chance of building a strong moral and spiritual foundation in the heart of her young child, teaching a system of truth and values without the constant challenge of authorities and peers whose lives are totally different. When these advantages are taken away from a child, how can we not count them as a loss to a whole generation of children who are hungry for direction, love, stability, and individual attention?
Painting ~ Mother and Daughter, George Goodwin Kilburne 1839-1924
Wikigallery public domain
