That's One Way to Get a Telemarketer Off the Phone

Overheard while I'm in the bathroom...

Phone rings.

Preschooler: Hello? No. I'm sorry, she's not available. She's pooping.

Celebrate the Small Stuff

I've been MIA in the "Small Successes" world. Why? Because I haven't felt one bit successful. On one hand, I've still been trying to do too much. But my overly ambitious efforts and ideals often result in me doing too little. When a friend recently called to see how I was doing, I suffered from severe logorrhea instead of giving the poor dear (who could use some encouragement) time to share her story. I'm behind on laundry. My preschooler described my legs as "furry" (thank goodness my hair is blond and not too noticeable except to petting hands). Yet, perhaps it's when I'm feeling like a big flop that I need to celebrate the smallest of successes more than ever. So here they are:

1. I tackled the furry beast legs, and I shaved off a mole in the process (the mishap happened after the baby started to cry and my preschooler ran in to the bathroom to tell me the toddler was putting small things in her mouth). Holy moly that hurt, but it's one less mole the derm will have to inspect during my August skin check appointment. (Another related success is that I finally got around to scheduling this appointment after my responsible husband got on to me about it.)

2. Instead of complaining about a husband-caused-clutter-of-a-closet, I cleaned it up. And I didn't even gloat about the fact that I'd decluttered his mess. (Bonus points for Mom.)

3. I've been trying to go to bed earlier and have stopped thinking of sleep as a "waste of time" or a "luxury" and instead am trying to see it as a good-mom-mandate.

I made the decision to retire earlier this past weekend after I thought about how for my past three confessions, I've asked to be forgiven for being too impatient with my children when this really isn't the root of this recurring pattern of petulance on my part. My impatience, I've observed, is directly correlated to my level of exhaustion, and my exhaustion was partly of my own making. I was skimping on sleep to do things that I thought were more important when, in reality, sleep is what I need most of all in order to be a gentle, patient mother (and, really, that's far more important than some of the crazy things I was staying up late to do).

Since my little epiphany, our days have gone more smoothly, and I'm feeling less frazzled even when I do have a rough night with the baby. Actually, now that I've written that, I'm seeing that this isn't a small success at all. Reordering my priorities and recognizing sleep as "me time" isn't easy, but it's a must right now.

Share (and celebrate) your own and other moms' small successes at Faith & Family Live!

The Cheese Stands Alone

There's a great discussion going on over at Faith & Family LIVE! after Arwen Mosher's excellent post where she asks an important question: How should we strike the balance between encouragement and realism with our kids?

She writes,

"I think it’s great to tell kids that most things are within their reach if they work hard enough. But my perception is that the 'if you work hard enough' part of that proposition has mostly been dropped in popular society.

It leads to situations like the case of a teenaged boy I knew a few years ago. He planned to be an engineer. He was also failing half his classes because he couldn’t be bothered to turn in his schoolwork. He saw no disconnect between his goals and his behavior.

Encouragement is a wonderful thing. But I think that the encouragement that we give kids these days could benefit from a healthy dose of realism."

I couldn't agree more.

Her post actually reminded me of a news story I heard about a local preschool that removed the line, "The cheese stands alone" from "The Farmer in the Dell." Their reasoning? No cheese (or child) should have to stand alone.

I kid you not.

Most parents and educational institutions won't go this far (I hope) in artificially padding children's self-esteems. But the way I see it, even if we're guilty of taking less ridiculous steps to shield our children from the struggles they're sure to face, we're still only sharpening their disappointment in the end.

Life isn't fair. And sometimes it's hard. Really, really hard. But life's not all doom and gloom. It's through their very struggles, hard work, and their overcoming of obstacles (including loneliness) that children find their way and gain a real sense of self-worth as well as an awareness that nothing in life is free with the exception of God's love. It is often when we are stripped of nearly everything that we are most aware that God is all we ever needed.

As much as I want my "babies" to be happy and to dream big, I know that struggle is a good thing. We are entitled to nothing. I have to encourage them to sometimes stand alone on their own two feet because I won't always be there to catch their fall. And when they do find themselves face to face with adversity, I pray that I will have served them well and that they will be primed not only to persevere but to also accept their limitations, to let God in, and to live "Thy will be done" instead of "My will be done."

The cheese may stand alone, but my children never will.*

*I edited my conclusion a bit, thanks to Karen.

Loving Your Postpartum Body

I'm over at Faith & Family LIVE! today writing about a topic I'm passionate about: How real moms can come to terms with their postpartum bodies stretch marks and all.

I always love hearing from readers, so I'll see you over there!

Encouraging Little Hemingways

One of my "side jobs" is teaching creative writing to children. This summer I've been teaching a workshop of sorts to children, ages 7 to 9. Although I'm paid to nurture these budding writers, I've found the best reward for teaching creative writing to children is not monetary. These kids are filled with raw talent, and I think they inspire me far more than I inspire them. What a gift it is for me to see inside their minds, to see their inner muses unleashed.

As a boring, old and dare I say cynical adult, I don't always notice the small details in life. When my girls and I venture out on nature walks, for instance, I look for big things like the clambering the snapping turtle we recently observed along the shoreline of a nearby pond. But my little ones, they see it all: The tiny trail of ants marching along a fence line, the fragments of mica flickering in the sunlight, plain leaves I trample upon without so much as a second glance...Children are incredibly attuned to sensory details. Maybe that's why they make such good writers - if only we're able to overlook their misspellings and the rules of grammar and logic they're constantly breaking.

Even the children who have a hard time with writing according to their moms are eager to weave words together to tell a story when they're encouraged to create rather than to follow a set of strict rules for writing (I detest the five paragraph essay; I see its purpose, but it's just so confining). Most children are just waiting to let their pencils fly across the paper to create a story or a poem, or even a crazy, creative cluster that begins with the word "night" and somehow spawns words like pizza, fairy, and birthday. We just have to let them create and put aside our expectations for what a story ought to look (or sound) like. There's a time and place for teaching structure, grammar, syntax, and spelling, but every child also needs time to just write whatever comes into his or her mind.

I'm often surprised by what these children come up with. Sometimes when I hear the details they include in their stories like "the ocean foam lapped on my ankles like whipped cream," "the fish was as small as a flaxseed," or "the earthy smell after the rain fills the air, and I'm reminded of my mom's garden," I forget my oldest student is only 9.

Recently, we discussed the hallmark of good writing is to show not tell. As a prewriting group exercise, I wrote the following statement on a dry erase board: "Grandma was beautiful for many reasons." I then asked the children to imagine a beautiful grandma. I pointed out that "beautiful" wasn't simply referring to physical attributes but also to how a person reveals love and truth. Likewise, I told them they could create a mental image of their own grandma or of a fictional one. There were no rules. After they brainstormed for a bit, we went around the room, and each child shared a detail of their "beautiful grandma."

This is what the children came up with:

Grandma is beautiful for many reasons. She has glossy, white hair that reminds me of silver strands. She has a comfortable smell that always reminds me of the comfortable way she lives. Simply. She lives simply. And her kitchen always smells of cinnamon or like an apple pile right out of the oven.

She has sparkly, blue eyes that are always smiling. Her smile is so welcoming - like the smile God will wear when he welcomes me to heaven.

She's the warmest person I've ever known - it's like she carries the sunshine in her soul.

And her voice? It's like a bell. It always rings true.

She's wrinkled, too, like a Sharpei puppy.

Oh, but she's beautiful. Truly, truly beautiful.

Lovely, isn't it? I should note that all my students are currently girls (hence, the silvery strands of hair and puppy references), but I've taught boys as well, and they, too, come up with colorful details.

So let your children write. Hand them a pencil (or pen or even a keyboard) and tell them that for today the only rule is that you must write. And when they share their art with you, put your adult world view aside, talk less and listen more.

Sisters Having a Heart-to-Heart

Uh-huh, uh-huh. Big sister, I couldn't agree more.



I was not privy to the details of their exchange, but it seems that M.E. was pleased with whatever big sister had to say during their little tête-à-tête.



Aren't those rolls delicious?

Raising Little Women...Sort Of

To lighten things up a bit, I'm sharing my most recent parenting column, which really makes the fact that some people have referred to this stinky, little blog as "spiritual" a tad embarrassing. You'll understand the "stinky" reference soon enough.