Family With a Purpose

Years ago, Darrin and I were a young couple just starting out and were hoping to have a family sometime in the near future. One summer we were touring a house and noticed a frame on a stairway wall containing a “family mission statement”. It was beautiful language around what made their family unique and we agreed that it was something we’d like to incorporate into our future family. We sort of forgot about it once the kids actually started arriving when things like laundry, sleep, and basic survival took over.

It wasn't until I recently read a book by Patrick  Lencioni, the well known author  of The Five Dysfunctions of a Team, that I was reminded about the family mission statement idea...

Sibling Love

This post is for my friend, Alli, who helped me start this blog. Alli has three adorable children ages 4 and under. We’ve been there (our oldest’s 4^th birthday was days after our third child’s birth) and while the first few years were physically challenging (I still appreciate and am grateful for a good night’s sleep and still value the day when I realized everyone could put on their own coat and tie their own shoes - wait, we can just walk out the door…now??) the present days are giving me glimpses of that unique bond siblings have when growing up very close together and realize just how special it is. Yes they still drive each other crazy and sometimes for their own safety need to be separated, but there are moments that definitely make those sleepless nights feel very far away and make me so thankful for a house full of chaos...

Failure IS an option

Everyone I know wants their kids to do well in school and have a successful experience. We want the best for our kids and aspire to teach them to be responsible, independent, productive students. We all know the cliches about "learning more from failure than success" and the stories of people like Michael Jordan being cut from his high school basketball team, but when it comes down to it we continue to rescue our kids and rob them of the daily lessons that teach them the very essence of responsibility, independence, and productivity. 

 When I taught middle schoolers, I could easily recognize those students who had been "rescued" throughout their elementary school years...

Family Time

Community is an important part of what makes our family who we are. Darrin and I believe that God wires us for community, and we live in such a way that friendship and extended family play an active role in our lives. We give those relationships priority and focus. We get together regularly with other families and plan weekend trips together with all of our kids. Our house has an open front door that many people use regularly and we like it that way. We’re also both very close to our families and vacation with both sides each year. There are bonds that are strengthened and deepened with every trip.

We wouldn’t trade any of these relationships for anything and feel there are immeasurable ways both we and our children benefit, but as the kids began to get older and busier, we realized we needed to create some protective boundaries around our family time  - those times spent together with just the five of us. We are intentional about camping trips or other weekends away that just involve us, but we wanted to set up something consistent and lasting that would build into our family priorities of quality time together.

One night a week is “Family Night” at our house. No school or sports activities, phone calls, email, visitors, or other distractions...

Destination Imagination

As a long time supporter of Destination Imagination and a former teacher, I am passionate about this program that includes, but goes beyond, the academic standards to train future leaders in such areas as teamwork, problem solving, and creative thinking. I fully support our schools working to improve test scores and raising curriculum standards, but years from now when our kids are making a difference in the world, these creative problem solving abilities and decision making experiences will matter just as much, if not more than, their SAT scores. I believe that whatever the field, most of us find ourselves working on a team that has an objective, a deadline, a budget, and a direction, and the job is to work together to solve the presented problem. That’s what these kids are learning...

Throwing Punches

Huge disasters resulting from desperate attempts to teach my children something of value always seem to provide a lesson for me instead.

My mom was a great mom. I mean great. I grew up in a house with 2 sisters and a special needs brother. She rarely yelled and always seemed to know what to do in a situation – guiding us and teaching us life lessons at the same time. There are often times in my daily parenting when I find myself asking, "What would Mom do?"

All kids go through the stage of arguing with their siblings. I actually believe it is invaluable experience in conflict resolution in a safe environment. But anyone who has kids old enough to argue know what I mean when I admit that this is the one of the things that make you want to throw things. Maybe at them. I remember one afternoon...

Scavenger Hunts

Scavenger hunts have been on my mind lately, probably the warm weather and the ability to go outside and run around – yeah spring! We had fun last week with a couple at the zoo and the nature center.

We drew 16 squares on a piece of construction paper and I wrote things to find on each kid’s appropriate to their age. At the zoo, Eric (6) had to find things like a mammal and an animal with a long tail, while Caroline (10) had to find things like an omnivore and an animal indigenous to South America. We laminated them to protect them from drops, tears, and spills...

Summer Book Clubs

A few years ago, my friend Teresa and I decided to hold a book club for our daughters and their friends. We wanted to keep them reading over the summer and thought it would also be a fun way to keep the girls connected through the off school months. That first summer we read a great book called "Trouble Don't Last" about a runaway slave. We met once a week for 6 weeks...

Find a mentor, be an encourager...

I've found that no matter where you are on the parenting journey, it's so helpful to have a mentor who is just a stage or two ahead of you. Years ago during the stage where we had three kids under four, I remember one particularly rough morning when I had exhausted my resources of books, games, puzzles, and snacks....all before 10 am. I secured the kids in their various containment devices (bouncy seat, exersaucer, and watching Clifford) and stepped out on the porch for a couple deep breaths of fresh air and a little perspective. Feeling a little better, I went back inside and we continued our day...

Just for the Joy of the Experience

While visiting Darrin’s family in Illinois this winter, we took the kids on their first ice skating adventure. While we’ve roller skated together, none of the kids had ever tried ice skating and found the indoor rink experience to be both exciting and hard work.

Caroline, 10, took advantage of the aid to help acclimate beginners to the motion of skating (which was very cool by the way – it was like a sliding walker) and took to the ice with her cousins, gradually giving up the tool and holding hands with her pals. She was a little nervous about falling and found the ice surface to be unforgiving and sometimes painful. She kept a good attitude though and had just as much fun hanging out and drinking hot chocolate with her buddies as she did on the ice.

Eric, 6, was determined to “do it myself” and declined the aid, working very hard to figure it out and accomplishing his goal of skating around the rink without help from mom, dad, or anyone else near him. There were tense moments of frustration but he stayed the course and persevered.

Adam, 8 , was the most fun to watch. Sheer abandonment of expectations, what people thought, or accomplishing anything, Adam threw himself (sometimes literally) into the ice skating experience. He had so much fun...

Journaling

My daughter and I have a journal that we write back and forth in to each other about various topics. It started when she was about 4, so the early pages have big, slanted sentences like, “I love you Mommy”, “Thanks for the new socks”, and “You’re the best”. Knowing how important communication is, I wanted to have several opportunities for us to be able to connect, as well as the goal of fostering a love of writing and the ability to express herself in written form. I have found that just like adults, sometimes it feels safer for a kid to write down questions or feelings rather than talk about them first. Sometimes we have an exchange in the journal that starts on the surface and then goes to a place where it’s time to talk. Then we’ll have great conversations in the quiet of her bedroom about an issue that she has been sorting out in her head for awhile.

I think she’s learned a lot about processing her thoughts. Sometimes you can journal your way through an issue – how are you feeling, are you over-reacting? Is the solution within the words you are writing? She’s learned that self-reflection and prayer can provide clarity and direction in a way much different than verbal conversations.

Caroline is a talker anyway, so much so that now we sometimes use the journal in a “write that down in our journal and we’ll talk about it later” kind of way, but my friend’s daughter is more quiet and keeps things inside – how she’s feeling, what she’s thinking, and what may be bothering her. When my friend heard about the journal Caroline and I have, she became very excited and started one for the two of them. She tells me it absolutely changed their relationship. There was a level of trust within the writing and her daughter was able to express herself in written form in a way that really opened up their communication.

At 10, Caroline now has several journals in a variety of sizes, designs, colors. She has a chronological diary of events, a dream journal where she writes prayers and ways she hears God speaking to her and through others, and other random ones where she writes story ideas and song verses. We still also have “our journal” that we get out and have written conversations about our lives.

I love that Caroline and I can continue sharing our love of writing and that we’ll always have those early years recorded in her own handwriting – even if it only says, “Thanks for the new socks!”