One of my greatest joys is listening to my boys sing. Carter enjoys singing, but Daniel absolutely loves it. Oftentimes he will be singing in the back seat and out of nowhere he will point at me and say, “Hit it, Mama!” So I jump in and pick up wherever he leaves off.

Lately we have been singing “You Are My Sunshine”. One afternoon, after we sang a very silly rendition, Daniel said, “Are me and Carter your sunshines?”

I smiled, “Yes, you and Carter are my sunshines. And Daddy, too.” Daniel smiled and went back to singing.

Tonight, as I was drying him off after bath time, Daniel grabbed both my cheeks and said, “Mama, you are MY sunshine.”

I couldn’t help but smile from the inside out as I hugged my sweet little man.

As parents, we truly can be the sunshine in our children’s lives. We can come home happy, joyous and overflowing with hugs and kisses, even when we have had a bad day. We can choose to stop and listen to the same story for the eighteenth time with a smile on our face. We can play trains, drink tea, wear a crown, drive a race car, or have a dinosaur fight one more time. We can even sit down and listen to all of the drama this is going on in our teenager’s world with focused intention. We can make a choice to leave our cloudy day at the door and be the sunshine to ones we love.

I would love to know that I can always be the sunshine in my children’s lives. How about you? Are you someone’s sunshine? Keep on shining.