Sometimes I wake up and feel like I'm about to live the exact same day I lived yesterday.

I already know most of what needs to be done before I even get out of bed.

Getting the children ready, preparing meals, cleaning up, doing laundry, taking care of my little one, and trying to find time for the other things I need to do.

And somehow, even after a very busy day, I can wake up the next morning and find myself doing most of it all over again.

I sometimes laugh about it because how can I spend an entire day doing so much, only to wake up and have almost everything waiting for me again? 😂

For a long time, this was one of the things I struggled with most about being a stay-at-home mother.

And I want to say something here, because I think it's important.

I love being home with my children. I love being present for the little moments of their lives, watching them grow and knowing that I get to be part of their everyday experiences.

I'm grateful for that.

But I also have days when I feel tired of the routine.

Days when I wish I could wake up without immediately thinking about what needs to be done. Days when I want to go somewhere, do something different, or simply have a little time that doesn't revolve around somebody needing me.

And sometimes, I look at the world around me and feel like everyone is moving forward while I'm still doing the same things.

I know that's not necessarily true, but there have been days when it certainly felt that way.

Especially when I think about how much I do throughout the day and how little of it seems to last.

The meals get eaten.

The laundry gets dirty again.

The kitchen needs cleaning again.

And tomorrow, everybody will still need breakfast. 😂

Sometimes you can spend an entire day working, taking care of people, making sure everything is running smoothly, and still go to bed feeling like you haven't accomplished much.

Not because you didn't do anything, but because so much of what you did will need to be done again.

I think that's something many mothers understand, even if we don't always know how to explain it.

And then I started noticing little things.

My daughter is nine now, and there are things she does today that I used to do for her every single morning.

For years, I prepared the children's snacks for school.

I knew what they liked, what they didn't like, and what they were probably going to bring back home untouched. 😂

I was the one making sure everything was ready.

And now, she gets up and prepares their snacks.

Sometimes I look at her doing it and remember when she was the little girl waiting for me to do everything.

I didn't wake up one morning and suddenly have a daughter who knew how to prepare snacks.

We had spent years doing those little things together. She had watched me, helped me, asked questions, and slowly learned.

And now something that used to take up part of my morning has become something she can do herself.

My son is growing in the same way.

There was a time when getting dressed meant I needed to be right there helping him through every step.

Now he can dress himself.

There are things we practiced over and over, things that required so much patience, that have slowly become part of what he can do independently.

And my youngest is growing too.

I remember when sitting down to eat meant stopping constantly to feed him.

Now we can sit together and eat our meals.

Of course, he still needs me for plenty of things. 😂

But when I think about how different our days are becoming, I realize that so much has changed without me even noticing when it happened.

There wasn't one big moment when everything became easier.

There were just hundreds of ordinary days.

We kept doing the same things.

We kept practicing.

We kept learning.

And somewhere along the way, the children began doing things that once seemed so far away.

It made me wonder how much progress I had been overlooking simply because it didn't look like progress at the time.

They're learning even when I'm not teaching.

Something happened recently that made me think about this even more.

A client came to my home, and afterward she told me how kindly my children had welcomed her.

They offered her slippers, showed her where to go, and even offered her water.

She was impressed and asked me how I had taught them to be so considerate.

I smiled, but I remember thinking about her question afterward.

Because I hadn't gathered my children together one afternoon and taught them a special lesson on how to welcome visitors.

They had simply watched me.

They had watched the way I receive people in our home, the way I speak to them, and the little things I do to make them comfortable.

And somehow, those little things had stayed with them.

I think about how often we wonder whether our children are paying attention to what we say.

Sometimes we repeat ourselves so much that we begin to wonder if anybody is listening at all. 😂

But then something happens, and we realize that they've been learning in ways we didn't even recognize.

And that moment reminded me that there is so much happening in our homes beyond the things we can immediately see.

All those ordinary mornings, the repeated reminders, the little conversations, the things we do almost without thinking.

Our children are growing up inside those moments.

They're learning from what we say, but they're also learning from how we live.

And that made me appreciate some of the things I had started taking for granted.

But I still get tired of doing the same things.

I want to be careful here because I don't want this to sound like I've discovered the beauty of repetition and suddenly every day feels wonderful. 😂

Absolutely not.

I still have days when I don't feel like doing any of it.

There are days when the house feels too noisy, when I'm tired before the afternoon even begins, or when I wish somebody else could take over for a little while.

Sometimes I just want to be able to think about myself without first thinking about what everybody else needs.

And I don't think that makes me any less grateful for my life.

I think we can love our children deeply and still need a break.

We can appreciate being home with them and still miss parts of the lives we had before.

We can be thankful for the opportunity to raise them and still have dreams and ambitions that don't revolve around motherhood.

I know I do.

There are things I want to build, places I want to go, things I want to learn, and parts of myself I'm still discovering.

And sometimes it can be difficult to make room for all of that when the everyday responsibilities of motherhood take up so much space.

So when I talk about finding beauty in repetition, I'm not saying we should ignore how tiring it can be.

I'm not saying we should stop asking for help or convince ourselves that we don't need rest.

I think those things matter very much.

I'm simply learning that even on the days when my life feels repetitive, it doesn't necessarily mean nothing is happening.

Maybe I've been looking at progress differently.

For a long time, I think I associated progress with something new.

A new achievement, a new opportunity, a completed project, or something I could look at and feel proud of.

And I still love those things.

But motherhood is teaching me that some of the most meaningful changes in our lives happen so gradually that we barely notice them.

Sometimes it's a child learning to do something independently.

Sometimes it's the way our children begin to speak to other people.

Sometimes it's the little habits they develop from watching us.

And sometimes it's the changes happening in us as mothers.

The patience we didn't know we could develop.

The things we learn to let go of.

The way we begin to understand our children better.

The way we learn to apologize, to listen, to try again, and to recognize when we need to do something differently.

I look back at the mother I was when I had my first child, and I know I'm not exactly the same woman today.

I've learned so much, and I still have so much to learn.

There are things I would do differently now. There are things I'm proud of. There are moments I wish I could go back to, and others I'm grateful we've grown through.

And most of that learning didn't happen during extraordinary moments.

It happened while we were living our ordinary lives.

While I was preparing meals, cleaning up, answering questions, comforting someone, correcting someone, or trying to get everybody ready and out the door on time.

I was growing too.

I'm learning to appreciate what I can't always see.

These days, when I catch myself feeling like I'm doing the same things over and over, I try to remember how different our lives were just a few years ago.

I think about the things my children can do now that once required all my attention.

I think about the habits they're developing and the little ways they're becoming more independent.

And I remind myself that so much of that growth happened during days that probably felt very ordinary when we were living them.

Of course, I don't always remember this in the middle of a difficult day.

Sometimes I'm just tired, and that's all there is to it. 😂

But when I do stop and look around, I see how much has changed.

And I find myself wondering how many other things are happening right now that I won't fully appreciate until years from now.

Maybe one day I'll look back and miss some of these mornings, even the ones that felt so long.

Maybe I'll remember the little voices calling for me, the constant questions, the toys everywhere, and the meals we shared.

Maybe I'll remember how much they needed me, and how gradually they learned not to need me for everything.

I don't want to rush through these years just because some days feel repetitive.

But I also don't want to pretend that I have to enjoy every moment to appreciate the life I'm living.

I think there's room for both.

I can be tired and grateful.

I can need a break and still love being here.

I can want more for myself while appreciating everything that's already growing around me.

And I can have days when I feel like I'm standing still, even while my children and I are changing in ways I haven't noticed yet.

Perhaps that's what I'm beginning to understand about the repetition of motherhood.

It's not always exciting, and it's certainly not always easy.

But sometimes, while we're busy doing the same things every day, something beautiful is happening.

Our children are growing.

We're growing too.

And one day, we may look back and realize that so much of what we were hoping for was quietly taking shape in the middle of those very ordinary days.

I shared a little about this on TikTok too, because it's something I've been thinking about for a while. If you'd like to hear me talk about it, you can watch the video here: https://vt.tiktok.com/ZSboPPYDL/

With love,

The Mother 🤍