Letting Go

Sarah has walked home from the bus by herself for most of her kindergarten year. She started first grade this year and I went to pick her up the first day. She had all day kindergarten, but most of her friends did not. I was waiting with other moms to pick her up and they started to ask me questions about the bus and what I did last year. They were a little more worried than I was about them walking home and brought up some of the things that could possibly happen. I left wondering if maybe I should be picking her up everyday which led to thought of "
How do you know?" How do you know when to protect them and stay by their side and try and keep bad things from happening to them and when do you let them go on their own? One of my favorite lines in Nemo is when Marlin, Nemo's Dad, says to Dori "I promised him that I wouldn't let anything happen to him." and Dori says "That's a funny thing to promise..." All my thoughts on parenting usually lead me to ask "What would or does Heavenly Father do for us?" He has all power to stop bad things from happening to us, and he does, yet he doesn't at times. He allows us to make choices to try things out and he is there for us no matter the results. He gives standards, guidelines and rules, all with consequences, but he lets us go out on our own so we can learn. He gives us all the tools we need to make choices, such as the scriptures and prayer. I came to the conclusion I can do two things, one is try to mimic our Heavenly Father and his plan, to give them rules and guidelines and the tools they need to make choices. The second thing is I can pray. Pray that as they leave the house they will be protected and watched over. Pray that they will make good choices and follow the Saviour. With the power of prayer I will be given the power to have hope and peace of mind. So for now Sarah will continue to walk home from the bus by herself, but I don't know if I will let Courtney date until she is 21 or so.