Kid's Cleaning

Summer is in full swing, seems like it's just flying by and soon we'll be preparing for school. Summer is a great time to implement new routines before the hectic pace of the school year. At our house we've been implementing a new chore and cleaning routine both for Mom and for kids. A friend introduced me to the "FlyLady" and her system of cleaning. You can go to www.flylady.net for more information,but be prepared for the avalanche of e-mail if you sign up, you might just want to check the web site daily. Anyway, the kids are now wiping down the counters of the bathrooms daily and we've implemented a 15 min cleanup after dinner of the toy areas and bedrooms which has really cut down on weekly cleaning time and kept the house looking tidy. I've also started doing one load of laundry a day from start to finish. My laundry room has never looked this clean - ever and our laundry isn't wrinkled - who knew. The kids are also getting used to daily putting their clothes away.

Teaching kids to clean can take more time at the beginning than you're prepared for but it's so important for teaching kids responsibility. Last week my Grandmother came for the twins 5th birthday two days early (and of course I wasn't prepared), the kids were able to fully clean her bathroom for me while I made her bed. They were so happy to be able to help prepare for company and proudly announced what they had voluntarily done when Grams arrived. I buy windex wipes, clorox wipes and disposable toilet cleaners for the kids to more easily clean. They also are in charge of cleaning the mirrors,wiping down all the appliances, dusting and taking out the trash. My good friend Sara says,"It may not be house beautiful but it's hygenic."

Start teaching your kids to clean today, it will help them and you!

Categories: parenting

Devotions

School is out and summer has begun! Yeah! We started summer out by going to Disneyworld for a week with our good friends, the Parrotts. We had an amazing time, vacations always seem like a good barometer on family dynamics and character training. The kids were great and behaved well even during long lines, late nights and hot, HOT weather. Praise God! All the hard work of parenting does pay off!

Summer is a great time to make sure your kids have a good biblical foundation, even as babies and toddlers. We, as parents, need to make devotions a priority even in summer. (We need to do them by ourselves and with our children). The kids and I are reading ( and singing) "Hymns for Kids" by Bobbie Wolgemuth and Joni Erickson Tada through Focus on the Family. We are reading about great men and women of faith and learning the story behind many great hymns. Yesterday we learned about John Newton who wrote ,"Amazing Grace". John Newton was a captain of a transport ship carrying slaves from Africa who later came to know Christ and eventually played a major part in outlawing slave trading in Britain. We learned that we needed to be doers of the Word of God not hearers only. This starts out our day with great practical ways of living every day for Christ. If you have babies and toddlers, there are great story bibles out for that age range. Make a point of reading the Bible in chronological order to your kids to provide a firm biblical foundation.

Categories: parenting

Prince Charming

Warning - this post may contain opinions which are not very popular. Today, we like to think of girls and boys being equal. That girls are as strong and tough as boys and that there is no difference between the sexes, and I believe that's not true. Okay, I admit that girls sometime have to be tougher than boys and that my little girl is willing to not only touch a tarantula but hold one (the boys were cowering 10 feet away), but in the end, we women want a protector. Not only a protector but a headship, a leader. God set this in motion when the world began. In Genesis 2:18 it says, "The the Lord God said, "It is not good for for the man to be alone; I will make a helper suitable for him." then God proceeded to make Eve. Did you catch what God said? The women was to be the helper, not the leader. ( I know, I struggle with this too - I'm mouthy and by personality a dominant) So as parents, it is our job not only to model this relationship but to teach both our girls and boys their responsibilities in this. ( I am not getting into a discussion of submitting to the extreme, I am talking about a stable relationship with Godly men and women.)

When Caileigh and Collin were two, they both were very interested in Princesses and Knights so we gave Caileigh, Princess dresses and bought the boys swords, shields and all the Knightly gear. During the course of play, we told our boys that they were to be the protector of the Princesses in their life. They must protect them from dragons and evil men and anything else that might harm them. They must have manners like Knights and open doors for ladies, to step first into danger, and to escort the Princess to ensure her safety. For Caileigh, ( who is like me, and questions obedience and submission) , we stressed that Princesses must never use tears to get her way and that she needs to listen to the trusted Knights in her life because they may know of danger that she's not aware of and that she needs to allow those trusted Knights the privilege of protecting her from harm, Daddy, of course, being the most important Knight and Protector. This sort of play has also led to manners lessons and talk of being ladies and gentlemen. My boys at 8 and 4 1/2 open doors for ladies, both members of their family and perfect strangers, which always gets noticed as being exemplary and have several offers of marriage from parents of young girls. I am going to be bold and encourage you train your boys and girls in a similar way, their future marriage may be much smoother for it.

Categories: parenting

Home Schooling Works!

Our son, Connor, took his first set of standardized tests this year as per Colorado law, which says that students starting in third grade and every other year after should be tested. As a home schooling Mom, this was a bit stressful. We knew that Connor was bright and we thought we had taught him what he needed to know but the question of how well he would do still nagged at the back of my mind. Connor, being a bit of a perfectionist, always stressed at tests and lost his self-control, so at the beginning of this school year, I began testing him daily on everything so that he would get more used to testing and lose his fear. On the days of the testing, he handled it beautifully, even though he was in a strange enviornment and surronded by 20 other kids who were also testing for the first time and very nervous. I was proud of how self-controlled he remained through out the two days. ( Yes, self-control hands even worked in this situation to help him focus on something concrete.)

We received the results back yesterday and they were even better that I had anticipated in my best case scenarios ( yes, I thought about best and worst case scenarios - after all I felt like I was being tested as well.). Connor scored higher than even the national homeschool average.

Here's a quote from one study:

In 1997, a study of 5,402 homeschool students from 1,657 families was released. It was entitled, "Strengths of Their Own: Home Schoolers Across America." The study demonstrated that homeschoolers, on the average, out-performed their counterparts in the public schools by 30 to 37 percentile points in all subjects. A significant finding when analyzing the data for 8th graders was the evidence that homeschoolers who are homeschooled two or more years score substantially higher than students who have been homeschooled one year or less. The new homeschoolers were scoring on the average in the 59th percentile compared to students homeschooled the last two or more years who scored between 86th and 92nd percentile.

All this to say that if you have not given home schooling a consideration in your educational choices for your children than perhaps you should. I know that there are other options other than home schooling but make sure you consider all the pros and cons carefully. For more information check out www.hslda.org or in Colorado www.chec.org.

Categories: parenting

Character Training

I know we've talked about having "J.O.Y." ( Jesus, Others, Yourself) in a previous blog but the kids and I have been memorizing a verse that really hides this truth in their hearts. Matthew 22:37-39 says this,

"Jesus replied: " 'Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.' This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.' All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments."

We need to be continually helping our children ( and ourselves) hide the Word of God in their hearts. They need to know that these aren't just rules we set up, but that God himself did. All of our rules need to have a moral or a safety value behind it and we need to be able to share with our children those values. We need to share the "why" of the rules so that our children can apply them to other situations. For instance, "Bobby, share the toy with Johnny." is instructive but it doesn't allow the child to know "why" he should be nice and share. However, if we have previously taught Bobby the value of loving others and putting others first we can say, "Bobby, are you thinking of others first by not sharing that toy?". We are teaching a value not merely issuing a command. Teaching values is what creates a Godly character. Look for the verses in the Bible that you can teach your children, for they should be the foundation of all character training.

Categories: parenting

Teaching the Truth at Easter

At Easter, as with Christmas, we parents have a great opportunity to focus the holiday on Jesus instead of the Easter bunny, candy, and baskets. Here's an easy way to teach your children the salvation message. For fun, we decorated foam cut out in the shape of eggs (eggs are a symbol of new life - which can be used to symbolize the new life we have in Jesus) in each of these colors and made them into Easter wordless books. We "read" them often so that our kids remember and can recite the salvation message.

Gold – reminds us of heaven and how great it us but we can't go with sin!
Black – reminds us that we all have sin and can't get rid of it ourselves.
Red – reminds us that God loves us so much that he sent Jesus to die for us to take away our sin.
White – reminds us that we can be cleansed from sin if we will believe in Jesus.
Green – reminds us that when we trust Jesus we begin to grow more like Him.

Duet 6:7 commands us as parents to talk to our children about God's commandments. It says to “talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you wake up.” We have a wonderful opprtunity to do just that at Easter. Focus on the Family website has some great ideas to help us as parents to teach about Easter. You can go to www.focusonyourchild.com/faith and click on “Finding Easter in Bunnies and Baskets”. I think you and your family will be blessed if you do!

Categories: holidays, parenting

Happy 10th Anniversary

This blog is dedicated to my husband of 10 years today! So many memories flash through my mind as I think of the last 10 years. From watching him him tear up as I walked down the aisle, gently rocking our first son, Connor, on the day he was born, going to Home Depot at 10:00p.m. to get me an air conditioner while I was pregnant with the twins so that I could sleep. ( Most women send their husbands out for food - not me , I needed a $600 air conditioner - now!) The years have had some down moments but for the most part we have been blessed by being together, our family and friends, a great church and delightful children.

I am so grateful that God sent me someone who is a partner in our parenting, home schooling and everything else that comes our way. I love you, Scott, and can't wait to see what the next 10 years have in store for us!

Categories: parenting

Surprised by Joy

Lately I have been reading much of C.S. Lewis. I just finished "Surprised by Joy" which is an account of Lewis' early life and his conversion to Christianity. One paragraph particularly caught my attention:

"In reading Chesterton, as in reading Mac Donald, I did not know what I was letting myself in for. A young man who wishes to remain a sound Atheist cannot be too careful of his reading. There are traps everywhere- " Bibles laid open, millions of surprises," as Herbert says, " fine nets and stratagems." God is, if I may say it, very unscrupulous."

As parents we must also be unscrupulous in managing what goes into our children . We need to make sure and provide them with books and thoughts that lead them to God. We never know what will grab our children's attention and may be used later for God's pleasure. In Psalms it says "Your Word have I hid in my heart that I might not sin against you." We must be sure to help our children hide the word of God in their heart but also provide them with other materials that peak their interest towards God.

In our home we are reading "The Chronicles of Narnia". In knowing Aslan our children can more fully understand Jesus. I also love George MacDonald's "The Princess and Curdie" and the "The Princess and the Goblins." " At the Back of the North Wind" is wonderful as well. For the younger ones we enjoy reading "Jeremy, the Tale of an Honest Bunny" by Jan Karon. Books on tape are a fun way to introduce them to great literature.

Categories: parenting

Valentines

Just a quick note with Valentines Day approaching, remember to include your children in your celebrations. Absolutely, take some time with your husband or wife to spend some quality alone time but make sure you make a point of letting your children how much you love them. Make a special breakfast with a handmade note and a few candies for each child or have a fun Valentine's Party with their friends. My husband not only brings me flowers every year but our daughter as well. She melts at the sight of the flower that Daddy gives her and insists on keeping it in her room where she can see it right before she goes to sleep. Our children are a blessing from God and we need to make a point of telling them that they are precious to us.

Categories: parenting

Getting along

This weekend we went to Snow Mountain Ranch near Winter Park, CO to celebrate my birthday. We haven't had much snow this year so I was missing the cold. We went sledding and tubing had a bit of a snow fight and made snow angels. We also went swimming and played a little basketball, all in all we had a great time. At Snow Mtn Ranch there are no T.V.'s or radios ( we did have to find a restuarant with a T.V. for the Broncos game) and you are forced to spend all your time together. Spending all your time together in the same room shows much about your children's relationship with each other. I love that my kids are best friends, they really are, I'm not just saying that. Some advice that we were given by other parents who seemed to have children that enjoyed being together:

1. Don't allow tattle telling. Make them work it out, you'll only get in the way. ( We allow them to come to us only after they've talked to each other or in cases of physical harm.)

2. Don't allow name calling - ever.

3. If one child has wronged another make them say sorry, ask for forgiveness and make it right.

4. Verbally reiterate that "We are a family that loves each other and are each other's best friends."

5. Make time for them to play together. Our rule is that if they can't play nicely together then they don't have the privilege of playing with other children.

I pray this works. I've seen this workwith other families who have created strong family relationships marked with respect and care for each other. If this weekend was an indication, I think we are on a road marked with success.

Categories: parenting

The J.O.Y. Patrol

Merry Christmas! The Christmas play is over, so I'm able to blog again! Here's a picture of Connor as Joseph and his friend, Lindsay, as Mary. Amongst the busyness we've tried to keep our Advent traditions going, most with success. One of the advent activities that our family enjoys is being the "J.O.Y. Patrol". Romans 12:10 says, "Be devoted to one another in brotherly love. Honor one another above yourselves." and John 13:35 says, " By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you lone one another."

The "J.O.Y. Patrol" stands for Jesus, Others, Yourself. Using this my children ( and myself) can remember what our priorities should be. God should always be placed first in our lives, then we should think of others needs and only after that our own. We've had fun making badges and door hangers with J.O.Y. on them as a helpful reminder. The kids enjoy having a secret name for doing the right thing.

There are many things you can do during the Christmas season as the J.O.Y. patrol. We bake cookies for our neighbors, give coins to the Salvation Army, make shoebox presents and generally just keep aware of opportunites to give. We don't do big things but hopefully things that show love to others.

Categories: parenting, advent

Taking Time for Tea

Yesterday my little girl, Caileigh, asked if I could play tea. I said that I couldn't, for I have a Christmas play to direct, laundry to fold and put away, dinner to make, presents to wrap, a budget to go over, and numerous other things that need to be done. Sweetly, Caileigh offered to help. She helped me put my laundry away, sang the Christmas play for me and wrote a label for Daddy's present. Caileigh didn't whine or complain that I wouldn't play she just wanted to be with Mommy. After an hour or so, I finally realized that all these things weren't very important. The play will go on, laundry can always sit in the basket, I could pull out a Supper Solutions dinner and everything else could just wait but Caileigh will only be four once. Soon she won't want me to have a tea party with her, she'll want to be with her friends. So, Caileigh and I had our tea party, we dressed up in funny outfits and called each other dahling. Caileigh made cookies in her pretend stove and we talked about all the things little girls like to talk about. We had a wonderful time. Perhaps next time Caileigh asks to have tea, I'll remember this lesson right away, laundry can wait but little childhood won't.

Categories: parenting

Advent

I love Christmas, I start putting the decorations and lights up as soon as my husband will get them up from the basement, which is usually the day after Thanksgiving. Some of my friends think I'm a little bit (okay a lot) off my rocker, but I get as excited as child as Christmas approaches. What I don't love at christmas is the “ I wants”. You know, “Mom, I want this new toy that just came out “ or “Mom, I need to write my 200 page list to Santa telling him what I want.” As parents we have to put extra effort in to combat the commercialism and materialism that abounds at christmas. We need to make sure that our children throughly understand that “Jesus is the reason for the season”.

Make (or buy but making is more fun) an advent wreath. This can be a fun way to start the season. The word “Advent” as defined by Webster means “arrival”. By observing advent the four sundays before Christmas we are looking forward to the arrival of Jesus' birth.

One fun activity for the first advent Sunday is to make a prayer chain for the number of days until Christmas and write a name or a character trait we pray for each day until Christmas.

See also: parenting

Little Eyes

Little eyes sometimes seem to notice everything that you don't want them to notice. At the mall, they notice the store with scary items in the front window or the store with the beautiful woman posing in underwear. There are so many things these days that are inappropriate for little eyes to see that it gets exhausting having to tell them," Don't look at that!". Isaiah 33 :14 & 15 says,
"He who walks righteously and speaks what is right, who rejects gain from extortion and keeps his hand from accepting bribes, who stops his ears against plots of murder and shuts his eyes against contemplating evil- ¹⁶ this is the man who will dwell on the heights, whose refuge will be the mountain fortress. His bread will be supplied, and water will not fail him."

We need to teach our little ones to shut their eyes from contemplating evil. At this year's homeschool convention I heard a speaker talk about how she taught her children an "eye bounce". An eye bounce is simply bouncing your eye from the inappropriate sight to something else, quickly. This is an easy way to teach your kids ( especially useful for boys as they get older) to eye bounce away from things that God doesn't want in our mind's eye and our heart. I also taught my children the little song " Be careful little eyes what you see, be careful little eyes what you see, For the Father up above is looking down in love so be careful little eyes what you see." This helps them to remembe that God does care what they see and what they put into their little innocent hearts.

Use the eye bounce this week as you go to the mall or anywhere in public that you can quietly remind them to "eye bounce" away from things that are not appropriate. Make it a game and have fun with it, just beware of funny looks as your children (if they're anything like mine) yell "Eye bounce" in chorus.

See also: parenting

More on self-control

In a parenting class my husband and I attended we were introduced to “self-control hands”. This is a great technique for little one's, actually it works for older kids as well. They simply place their hands in their lap and hold them together. For many children this helps them to focus and it direct much of their energy and wiggliness to their hands. To introduce this, you might play a game of 'who can hold their hands together and not talk, the longest.' This is a fun game because it doesn't take long for someone to erupt into giggles. As your children become more adept at this, offer a prize for everyone who can have self-control hands and quiet mouths for 30 seconds, then 60 seconds and so on. My children (even my very busy, very wiggly, outspoken little girl) have mastered the three minute mark. In situations where I can see they are about to lose control, I have them practice self-control hands and it has saved us much trouble. Make sure and practice in calm times so that you can use it in turbulent ones.

Remember to praise, prase, praise! Children thrive on praise so point out specific moments when they have used self-control. For instance, “I saw that you were about to get mad when your friend cut in line but I was really proud of the way you used self-control.” Also be sure to praise them when they are about to touch something or do something they shouldn't and use self-control instead.
See also: parenting

Setting Expectations

Our family just got home from a trip to California. We drove a total of 4 days (there and back) and spent two days in San Diego and three more in Anaheim at Disneyland (which is the happiest place on earth). As any parent knows, family vactions can either be bliss or they can be the bane of your existence. One of the ways we prepared our kids for our vaction was to give them a list of expectations we had for them. For instance, "There will be no asking are we there yet? We are on an adventure and are to enjoy even the car ride." (loaded of course with new Leapster cartridges, books, crayons and even the occcasional movie) . "We will be kind to one another and stay in our own space with our hands to ourselves." " We will keep our voices quiet in the car so as not to upset the driver." It's so important to let you kids know ahead of time what you expect of them. I like to know what's expected of me and kids do to. All of these expectations need to be met with a "Yes, Mommy or Yes, Daddy". Sometimes you need to set daily expectations. Once we had spent a day in Disneyland we realized that each child needed different expectations. For Connor(7), "Keep your hands to yourself and don't frustrate your brother and sister." For Caileigh (4), "Stay with Mommy and Daddy, you don't want to become lost." and for Collin (4), " Do everything without whining and complaining, including rides that you haven't been on yet." Each child obeyed and I have to say we had a great time - including the drive. I would do again, soon! Well, not too soon, there's laundry to be done!

See also: parenting

Self-control

Self-control is one of those fruits of the spirit that touches everything in our life. It touches what we say, what we do and how we do it. Webster's defines self-control as “restraint excercised over one's own implulses, emotions or desires.” Learning self-control is a life long exercise but we can begin introducing the topic while our children are young. Self-control techniques can really help during those tumultuous pre-school years. My four year old daughter gets told to exercise self-control daily if not hourly over the dramatics she presents us with. This is a very practical lesson to teach to your young (or old) ones that will serve them well all the days of their life.


Idea one: Titus 2:6 says, “... encourage the young men to be self-controlled. In everything set them an example by doing what is good. In your teaching show integrity and seriousness.” Many times as parents we dismiss behaviour's that are 'out of control' because they are too young to understand or because that's what two year olds do. I believe that we need to set a standard for our children and even though they might not always achieve it, the standard needs to stay the same. As parents, sit down and dicuss what standards you have for your children, particularly in self-control. For instance, we don't allow temper tantrums. They have the choice of either gaining self-control or going to their rooms. Once your standards are set, sit down with your children and tell them what your home standard's are. With young children you might say, “Mommy and Daddy will not allow you to yell, kick or scream, do you understand? If you choose to do that you may go to room.” Your child (you may have to prompt them) needs to be able to repeat back to you what you just said, so that you know they understand. As a side note, be sure you are not treating frustration tantrums (“I know this block tower goes together, but I can't do it.”) and temper tantrums (“I'm not going to bed and you can't make me!”) the same. In both situations, the child needs to gain self-control but their motives are different.

See also: parenting

A Case for Homeschooling

We homeschool our three children and while we understand that there are other good educational choices, we believe that no one understands our children like we do or can beat the one on one attention that a parent can give.

One reason that our oldest so favors homeschooling is that he has more time to pursue other interests - like inventing! While reading a George MacDonald book (yes, another ) I came across this quote,

"Mr. Simon never gave Cosmo anything to do at home, believing it the imperative duty of a teacher to leave room for a youngster to grow on his own, and that what a boy does by himself is of greater importance that what he does with any teacher. Such leisure time may be of rather small consequence for the multitude of boys, but it is absolutely necessary wherever one is born with a creative individuality."

So, we limit T.V. time and only allow video games with Daddy as a special treat and try to surround our kids with educational toys and books that strike our children's interest. We work hard in school for approx. 4 hours a day and then let our children have the freedom to grow on their own. Try it, you might be surprised what creative genius lies in your children.

For more information on homeschooling you can go to www.chec.org or nationally at www.hslda.org.

See also: parenting

Fruit of the Spirit II

Here's a few ideas that I've used with my children to help them learn the fruit of the spirit...

Idea One: Make a poster of the fruits of the spirit with small drawings of each fruit illustrating the word. These do not need to be masterpieces just stick drawings to help your child remember the words. Have your child think of someway he or she could show each trait. For example, “ I could show gentleness by petting the dog nicely.” or “I could show kindness by helping my little brother make his bed.” It's important to put these traits into concepts your children can understand.

Idea two: Use the poster from above and help your children memorize the fruit of the spirit. The pictures will help the smaller ones remember the words and the order. Try going over these once a day for a week, you'll be surprised at how much they can remember. My twins memorized these at two, of course it helped to get treats each time they said the verse.

See also: parenting

Fruits of the Spirit

"But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law."
Galatians 5:22-23

These are the fundamentals of not only who we want our children to be but what we should want to be. Let me be the first to warn you, once your children know and understand these traits they will keep you accountable on them as well. My oldest son, who takes things strongly to heart, will tell me quite respectfully,”Mom, I don't think that was showing good self-control.” The majority of the time he's right and I have to repent and apologize. It's so humbling to be admonished by a seven year old. Learning the fruit of the spirit young will be a life long blessing. Adults and children who are well versed in and practice these traits are a joy to be around and strong witnesses for the difference Jesus makes in our lives. We will talk about learning all of the fruit of the spirit and then we will focus on a choice few in later blogs.

As I watched television this week and read news reports about the devastation of Hurricane Katrina I realized that you could tell the difference in behavior of those who show fruit of the sprirt and those that do not. I don't know who knows Jesus by the T.V. reports but I did take time to point out to my children instances where people were helping others and comforting each other versus the people that were stealing and hurting others. We, as children of Christ, need to show the fruit of the sprit more to show the difference that Jesus makes in our lives and our children should as well.

My heart and prayers go to those affected by the hurricane.

See also: parenting