Last week I had the opportunity to take my 4.5 year old boy out for an one-on-one time.  Time alone with one of my children is very hard to come by so when the opportunity presents itself I have to make the best of it.  I took my sweet boy (a.k.a. “therapy boy”) to In-n-Out Burger joint where he happily ate fries and a strawberry milkshake.  I really enjoyed my time with him because he’s very unlike me.  He’s so random and the things he talks about cracks me up.  He engaged me in deep conversation pieces like why I don’t stand and pee like he does or why the french fries taste like potato.  I just like sitting and looking at him talk about various subjects that come to his mind.  I’m somewhat surprised that this boy of mine is quite talkative.

We have a very busy household and each child’s individual needs can be easily overlooked due to constraints.  We have to be very intentional about spending one-on-one time with each child to ensure that their thoughts and feelings are heard.  I believe it is important to have one-on-one time with your child as your schedule allows because by giving your child an opportunity to talk freely without his siblings, you can find out a lot of things on this particular child’s mind.  I want to make sure that my children’s hearts are filled and that they know that I love them and that their thoughts matter to me.  Spending individual time with each child is one of the ways of letting them know that I care about them.

As the fifth child of this family, Bethany is used to a lot of noise.  When the rest of the gang is off to naps, she does not do well in a quiet house even though her mama desperately needs a moment of peace.  This afternoon Matthew is keeping his baby sister company by reading to her, and whenever she fusses, he gently bounces her on the baby bouncer.  What a great big brother.

I’m in awe that my oldest has risen to the occasion to care for his baby sister. I’m actually seeing the fruit of my labor.  Just not too long ago I whined and complained that my life is all about sowing and not much reaping.  I’m beginning to see the fruits, and it’s such a joy to see my little boy growing up to a big and responsible boy.  What a blessing!

Here’s Matthew reading to Bethany:

During Sunday church services I typically sit alone with my five children during the singing part of the worship because my husband leads music for our church.  As I was holding down the fort yesterday during church, our 6 week old baby girl started to cry.  Bless my 6.5 year old man-child because his first instinct was same as mine; he went and picked Bethany up.  He held her, gave her a pacifier, and rocked her in order to comfort her.  After she was calmed and went back to sleep, he carefully put her back in the car seat.  About 10 minutes later, Bethany started to cry again.  My sweet boy hopped to his feet and rocked his baby sister in the car seat.  After she calmed again, he hopped back on to the pew to sit with the rest of us.  I was one proud mama!  He did all these without my asking.  I couldn’t help but brag a little about him to a friend afterward.

This morning as I laid in bed still needing more sleep, I asked my boy to serve his brother and sisters cereal for breakfast.  When I finally got out of the bed, I saw all the kids sitting at the dining table with their roo bibs on and eating cereal.  My boy even gave everyone blueberries in their cereal.  Again, I was so proud and felt much blessed.

Later in the day when my energy level dropped, I asked my boy to make me a cup of coffee while I nursed the baby.  He stirred in just the right amount of cream and sugar, just the way I like it and brought it to me.  Again, I was so proud.

I think I need to give him a badge of honor.

I write all these not because I want to brag about my boy (ok, maybe just a tad), but to remind myself that I need to express words of appreciation to my boy.  I told friends and my husband how proud I was, but later realized that I didn’t even tell the very person who did all these wonderful deeds how much I appreciated him.  Does he even know how I felt?  As soon as realized my faux pas, I brought my boy to me and told him how much I appreciated his help.  I chuckled inside because he was embarrassed when I praised him and didn’t want to look me in the eyes as I expressed my thoughts to him.

I think it is important to give praise to whom it is due.  Our children need to know that we appreciate them.  Too often they hear us correcting them for one thing or another.  How often do they hear us telling them our thankfulness for them and how much they’re an asset to us?  As much as we need words of affirmation, our children need the same.  I pray that I will always remember to tell them how much I love and appreciate them.

Yesterday we took all the kids to Lowe’s Build and Grow Clinic and each of them made a wooden time capsule.  What I love about this workshop is that it’s FREE!  Lowe’s sponsors a kid’s workshop every second Saturday of the month.  You have to sign up online, space is limited, so do so ahead of time to ensure a spot in the class.

Home Depot also has a monthly kids’ workshop that’s held every first Saturday of the month.  No sign-ups necessary so be sure to show up early to ensure a spot in the class.

Here are the kids hammering away building their “time capsules”:

The usual suspects in the line-up:

Wait. . . who is that blonde?  She’s our “visiting scholar.”

Whenever one of my children wrongs another, I ask the offender to apologize, but in a very specific way.  Too often I see parents asking their children to simply say sorry.  But merely saying the word “sorry” doesn’t cost the child anything, not does it actually involve admission of fault.  In addition, the child doesn’t know what he’s apologizing for or how he has wronged another.  For these reasons I have my children identify the sin and apologize with that specificity.  These are some of the examples from our little sinners:

• “I’m sorry I sinned against you by hitting you on the arm.  Will you please forgive me?”
• “I’m sorry I sinned against you by taking your toys.  Will you please forgive me?”
• “I’m sorry I was careless and stepped on your foot.  Will you please forgive me?”

Our children need to understand that in order for reconciliation to happen, they have to identify how they have sinned against another.  As I teach my children how to apologize, I find that this is a lesson not just for the little ones, but also for ourselves.

To illustrate how we’ve “successfully” taught our children to be specific about their sins, here’s a situation that just happened two days ago.  While playing happily together, my little 2.5yo girl started to cry and she then identified her brother as the culprit in hurting her.  Given the circumstance I deduced it was an accident so I said to my boy, “Andrew, I know it’s an accident that you stepped on your sister, but you still need to apologize to her for hurting her.”  Well, he protested and said, “Mommy, I DIDN’T step on her.  I kicked her!”  Hmmm. . . . We certainly got the “being specific” down.  We need to work on the repentance part.

I love homeschooling, but the work involved isn’t all rosy.  For one thing, it tests my patience A LOT!!!  It’s both good and bad as a homeschooling mom.  It’s bad because I get frustrated and it’s good because I know this is one way of refining my character.

While teaching my 4.5 year old to read this afternoon, I almost wanted to bang my head against the wall.  Well, not exactly, but you get my drift.  My 4.5 year old boy is a dreamer dwelling in his own happy little world.  It’s not an easy task to have him phone home to earth at times, or shall I say, most of the time.  This, of course, presents a huge hurdle for me to overcome as I teach this child.

This is one of the sentences he read today:

“She will take a pail and get the mail.”

After reading this my boy was concerned whether the pail truly belonged to the gal.  In order to speed up the lesson, I said, “Yes, of course it belongs to her.  She’s using it to get the mail so it’s her pail.”  Side tracking is my boy’s forte.  It makes perfect sense to him although the rest of us don’t see the connection.

My boy went on to read another sentence that goes like this:

“Did she tell you the tale of when the fox lost his tail?”

Well, this sentence doesn’t make sense to him as he protested, “Foxes don’t lose their tails!!!”  As an answer, I said, “In this story, they do!  Ok. . . moving on. . . . ”

Thankfully I was still sane after today’s reading lesson.  Even though I was frustrated, my boy brought me much amusement.  I’m so not like him and he certainly brings a colorful perspective into my otherwise boring world.  This is why I love homeschooling.  It’s not easy but it’s very rewarding.

Many of us have tried many times to read the Bible through one year without success.  I’m one of them, as is my husband.  I’m determined to conquer this seemingly monumental task this year with the hope that I can read alongside my blog friends.  Will you join me and read the Bible together?

The reading plan I’m using is originally devised by Discipleship Journal, and made available and formatted by Bethlehem Baptist Church.  With this plan, you read different selections from four different books of the Bible each day.  There are 25 readings each month which means you can catch up when you fall behind.  I especially like the bookmarks (click through the aforementioned link to print your own bookmarks) which are designed to be placed at four different points in your Bible to track your reading.

So, what say you? Will you join me?