Love Grows Best.

Recently, a sweet friend gifted me with this precious wall sign she herself owns and loves. This past summer, we had both moved from our very small first homes, into our much roomier forever homes. We'd shared several bottles of wine, numerous tears of crying rants, and too many conversations to count during this "More Stressful Than The Holmes-Rahe Stress Scale Rates It" stage of our lives. It was joyous and insane all at once and I will always feel so grateful we had each other's back during those long days down in the trenches of legal documents, real estate commissions, home showings, home inspections, and boxes. Lots and Lots of boxes.

Today this lovely sign rests sweetly on a small wall in our family room. I pass by it each and every day, several times, never missing her silent echo in my ear: Love grows best in little houses...
I love the sweet message and sentiment attached to it. I love it because I lived it. I know it to be   true. After all, we lived in our small home for over twenty years and I figure that pretty much makes me an expert on Small Home Living. 

And yet sometimes, on some days, especially lately, the sign trips me up.
Her silent echo taunts me and unnerves me. 
Rattles and unsettles.
Mocks, even.

What gives? My family is finally enjoying a much roomier home to spread out in and here I am wondering and worrying if it's Too much. Questioning the space and time and wondering what changes need to be made to ensure my teenagers spend more time Out of their bedrooms than In them. Is it too much space? Were we happier in 1400 square feet, on top of each other? Were we more in tune to each other when the walls didn't separate us?

These are the thoughts that cross my mind these days. These long days when my 15 and 13 year old children are all full of hormones, exhaustion, sweetness and attitudes combined, drama, stress, humor, stink and hormones... did I mention Hormones? 

Surely, this is just a normal second-guessing of sorts that All Good Parents of teenagers go through, right? Are we doing this Parenting Thing, correctly? Are we giving them enough space to grow and be, or are we giving them Too much space? Are we spending enough time connecting with them or too much time nagging them, hovering too closely?

These are the things that keep me up at night. I keep telling my husband that perhaps this is my mid-life crisis: the Mommy's Mid-Life Crisis. It's weird. And kind of pathetic. Certainly not even Lifetime  Movie Channel material. I don't want a fancy sports car or a young boyfriend on the side. I don't desire to join the country club or take up tennis. I just want to know that I'm not screwing up my kids and that they are happy and going to do REALLY, REALLY WELL when they leave this Maybe Too Big house of ours. That's really all that I want. Okay unless on that day, they are passing out free and guiltless Botox injections too! But otherwise, that's it. Really.

I just want to be at ease more often than not, with these kids. These babies of mine that were crawling, falling, smiling, hugging, napping and needing so much more, just a few years ago. I want to know that just because they spend more of their home time in their rooms FaceTiming their friends, or in my son's case, in some virtual Call of Duty war on Xbox Live, (eye roll / loathe) that I'm not losing them completely to the abyss of bigger spaces, more walls, less crowd. I want to know that they don't Hate us for forcing Family Game nights, or Sunday Drives to No Where In Particular.

We have more room between us now, and more walls to separate. And on my harder Mom Days, I worry even into the wee hours of the morning... Are we doing this right? Will we have done a good enough job? Did Love Grow Best.. Even in bigger houses, just like this?