Sunday, February 27, 2011

Parenting 101

A. Don't leave on foot for church 10 minutes before you are supposed to be there. You won't make it. B. Don't let your daughter think that you are stranding her on her bike and leaving her on the way to said church service. So, here is what happened. We headed out to church, me on foot, Elaina and Jack on bikes. Husband had already gone to church with other kids earlier, but happened to be leaving the house by car with the other kids at the same time. I was following Jack and Elaina on the bikes and got pretty far behind them, so when my husband was driving on the same street he pulled over and said, here, jump in and I will drive you up to where they are. About that time, my daughter turns her head around and sees me running over and hopping into a car on the side of the road, and probably figures I am ditching her, and her brother was way ahead of her. So we see her getting upset, so my husband jumps out of the drivers seat, and runs after her, and I drive the car to church. She was bawling thinking I was trying to desert her!!!! Poor baby! I felt awful. But that gave me a nice chance to explain to her that I would never ever leave her, and that as a matter of fact I was jumping into the car to get closer to her more quickly. But this incident spurred 2 parenting themes into my mind: 1. Sometimes we as parents make decisions that cause our kids to get upset, angry, cry, and even cause them to say they don't like us, or even hate us. And while these reactions from our children upset us sometimes, or make us even question our decisions, we have to remain strong in our resolve. It is soooo much better to be upset about upsetting our children now, than taking the easy out now that makes our kids happy and paying for it later with a spoiled, or unkind, or disrespectful child. 2. Sometimes we make decisions that we think our kids are going to be happy about, and lo and behold it is just the opposite. We meant well, we thought we were doing what they wanted, but they ended up getting hurt. For instance, we may think our kids would love to go to a pro baseball game, big musical show, or to the zoo and so we get tickets thinking they will love it, and we are so excited for them to see it or do it or whatever. And the day you are planning to go it ends up that you have a zillion other things going on, and yet you squeeze in the event along with it because you just KNOW that your kiddos will love it! And really what they would like best on this crazy busy day is some time at home to play with their legos or crash out in front of a movie for a while. Making the decision to think more about what our kids sincerely would like, not what we would want them to like, is a hard one for me sometimes. Also don't want to forget: -We went to the Rodeo today with some of Pete's work friends. I look over at one point during the rodeo, and my son Ben, who has befriended Pete's co-worker, is literally climbing onto his head. He has both arms on top of the guy's head and is resting his own head on top of that! The co-worker friend is just sitting there watching with my kid on his head! The friend has 3 boys of his own, but he could not have thought this was normal, as Ben has maybe met the man ONCE! My kids and their inhibitions are going a bit too far...not sure how to curb this. -Elaina is proudly working on her star of the week poster tonight. Hard decision: help her"fix" a few things to help her save face at school a bit (her fine motor skills are behind the other kids), but perhaps hurt her feelings myself, or let her do it all on her own.....ugh....... - I barely saw Charlie today - I had a shoot this morning, then he hung w his dad while I did church with other kiddos, then he went straight to grandmas for the day, and he fell asleep on his way home. I totally miss him!

No comments:

Post a Comment