Leaving or Staying. She sat across from me and said these words: “My family knows how to leave, but we don’t know how to stay. This time, I’m staying.” She made a conscious choice to stay instead of running. Although she didn’t really know how to stay, she was bent on learning – and she was doing it by staying put. She was bound and determined – aimed at learning to stay. We tend to … Read more
e shouldShow and Tell Those elementary school days of show and tell are a great way to tell classmates about things in our lives. One day, I took our newborn to school for Show and Tell in our kindergartner’s class. How much more fun it was for him to show the baby than it would have been to bring photos or just tell about his baby sister. His classmates crowded around, wanting to see the new … Read more
What Mind over Matter is. Mind over matter helps in mommying. Parenting is one of the hardest things we ever do. That’s because it’s 24/7. There is no time off and no “normal” work week of five days a week from 9 to 5! Sure, there are times you go away for an evening or even a weekend; but you’re always the mom away from her kids. When you’re home, you’re the mom from sunrise … Read more
Why The Birds and the Bees? Why is the illustration of the birds and the bees used to catalog a way of teaching reproduction to children? Using this illustration is metaphorical at best and lazy at worst. When our children ask questions about sex, they’re usually not old enough to understand a metaphor. Parents breathe a sigh of relief that “the talk” is done. The child is left clueless to the real facts. Yet, he … Read more
Parents should be fact checkers Mom Slabach was a sleuth. She said her child was as capable of becoming an “Adolf Hitler” as Hitler himself. She might have trusted her kids, but she didn’t trust the devil. Even when her kids were grown, she had ways of obtaining information about them. When Dave showed up on his motorcyle for a visit at her house, she meandered outside and walked around that bike, looking for scratches … Read more