Children

You ever notice how our children know how to push our buttons just right?  I mean they can frustrate us beyond measure in an instant they can also just as quickly melt our hearts.  I found myself today tried by Gabriel, I love him so but he was bouncing off the walls in the office at the high school when we picked up Tabitha.  I found myself holding him down with a gentile grip on his arms making him focus on me so he would listen and most importantly STOP!  I then thought how that must have looked not only to him but to others observing not only my actions but his behavior.  I realized that I was not only frustrated that he wasn't listening to me.  I was also embarrassed because of how he was behaving or really not behaving.  I found myself as we walked into the orthodontist office telling him if he behaved as he did earlier then he would find himself spanked and sent to bed as soon as we got home and he better not come downstairs until he was told he could.  He did behave well in the orthodontist office which I was very thankful for.  But I find myself thinking that I am not doing a good job teaching him the right way to contain himself when he is bored or things aren't going his way.  I am not teaching him a Godly way of going about things and I am trying to focus on doing a better job of this.  I think as parents our jobs are not only to discipline our children but teach them self discipline.  Gabriel really is a very Godly child or Christ like child in most ways granted he is a boy and when I say he is a boy that really should be BOY.  He always wants to say the blessing at dinner though he speaks quickly when doing so, he is very giving of himself often looking for ways he can help others.  Gabriel just bounces off the walls when he is expected to sit down and be quiet not meaning not talking but talking quietly.  That is unless his Daddy is there or I have threatened him like I did this morning.  I also didn't have to remind him this morning and it took a long time in the orthodontist office usually we are in and out in 20 minutes or less but they were busy today and it took every bit of an hour.  I did tell Gabriel that he did a good job and we are studying in our homeschool bible time Galatians 5:22-23 and going over the fruits of the spirit.  Hopefully during this study I can get across to him that he needs to be able to control himself even in times when it feels really hard to do so.