A Mistake is Only a Mistake if We Don't Learn From It
I'm going to turn this from a mistake into a lesson.
The boys and I headed out to pick some berries and ride around at the church. Kiedis (pictured above) is a master picker. For years now he has been able to identify every edible berry and he's so enthusiastic about picking them all, and even more enthusiastic about eating them.
Blackberries
Huckleberries
Blueberries, and we even found Raspberries too.
Here is our bucket at the beginning, we ended up almost filling it up...
Enter mistake #1. Poor Kiedis ended up dumping the bucket when it was almost full. It went down into a rocky crevice (berries unretrievable) and it's not Kiedis who made the mistake, it could have happened to anyone. It was me and my reaction to the situation. I got frustrated and mad. Said his name in my mad voice KIEDIS! He felt so bad...
So, earlier I was taking a bunch of photos, and I noticed this miracle Black Eyed Susan plant growing out of gravel! What a feat right?!
Enter Mistake #2.
I had brushed off the berry incident and was over hanging out with Stryder as he rode his bike...and there is Kiedis coming towards me...with the whole Black Eyed Susan plant in his hand, giving it to me. And I fucking did it again, just overreacted, and said his name harshly KIEDIS!, nooooooooooo!
I immediately felt like such a dick as his face crumpled into tears. He was just trying to make things right and I freaked out over the plant being destroyed instead of seeing his heart and what he was wanting to do by giving me the flowers.
How Can I Turn This Into A Lesson?
First off, a genuine apology. After I had cooled down again, and stopped the inside trash talk as well (I'm such a douche, terrible Mother etc etc) I told Kiedis how sorry I was, that I know he was trying to make me happy with the flowers and that I shouldn't have yelled. I explained to him about how picking the whole plant, now it may not come back next year. We decided we are going to spread our own Black Eyed Susan seeds over in that gravel in the autumn.
Consciousness. Another way I can keep this as a lesson. Taking a moment or TEN before I react. Before I even move a face muscle! These are just little guys, aged 7 and 8. I need to slow down, for them. I can put myself into Kiedis' shoes and imagine how it would have felt to see Mom's face and hear Mom's voice get so angry, over basically "spilled milk".
As for the berries, we found a bright side to that as well. Perhaps those seeds will grow a bunch of new berry plants where they fell. Perhaps they will feed a lot of bugs and animals that couldn't have reached them as they stayed drying on the bushes. Now it's a buffet!
Thank you again, for witnessing my journey through this life, my beautiful #STEEM #Ulog Family. Take care and have a wonderful weekend. Feel free to share your parenting Oooops/ Lessons with me in the comments!