In our youth we yearned to imitate adults. As adults, we are stuck with the habits of our parents. Habits we do not like, but pass onto our children.
Ask a question that has no answer. You’ll still get opinions. (for example – what do you tell your twelve year old child when one of his friends dies?)
When the inner bell rings that it is time to tingle-ling, and the phone rings the excitement of anticipation, both at the same time; a nine year old girl is going to answer the phone first. It will be a jumpy animated conversation.
Within an acorn exists the oak tree. A combination of soil, sun, water and security allow the oak to grow to its full potential. The same is true for a child. The person inside already exists; love, caring, discipline, security will allow them to reach their full potential. And like an acorn, no matter how hard one tries, it will grow to be an oak, not an elm nor cypress nor maple. The same is true for a child; allow him to grow into what he or she is.
“If a child asks ‘do you want to be a good father? A good father let’s his children do what they want to do.’ One answer can be, ‘if my two year old child wants to play in traffic, would I be a good father if I let him?’”
Not every plant grows like a weed. This fact applies to children as well, even children from the same seeds.
If the first parenting book you read seems to contradict your style Find another book. Eventually, you will find an expert that agrees with you.
Learning to strike a match. Can be a wonderful growing experience for a child. A lesson in facing ones fears.
If you are in the middle of a conversation with one of your children, Do you stop and rush to answer the phone if it rings?
Parents can think like children. As much as butterflies, can think like caterpillars.
Someday we will tell our children How hard we had it. Having to work hard to get our ketchup out of the bottle.
It’s a lot easier to get your children to bathe. After they hit puberty.
Homework seems to get done much faster, As time is running out.
When asked why he was walking around the block backwards, The five-year-old blue-eyed boy said, “It’s what my daddy does with his car when he wants to make it younger.”
When I was a kid, I would have made a much better parent.
The college years. Years of letting go and still clinging (the kids or the parents?). The excitement and the fears. Realizing your children are not you. They alone can be responsible for their successes and failures. I think?
What is the role of a parent? To help your child learn to love themselves and the wonder of the world we live in. To help them discover what they are good at and what they love to do. To help them understand the various cultures. To help them form habits of good manners. To help them be responsible and accountable for themselves as adults. Not to use your children as a toy to love you back. Not help you feel needed.
I did something silly and my teenage son, Tyler said, “Dad, you never cease to amaze me.” Then he said, he meant to say, “You never cease to amuse me.”
My less than 7 year-old daughter, Sarah, brought home an assignment for my wife, Kim, and I to complete. We did not realize we were supposed to send it back to school with Sarah. So when Sarah discovers she does not have it and is asked by her teacher where the homework is she replies, “My mom doesn’t have time to help me with my homework, she is always too busy lying on the couch, watching TV, or rented movies”!
Sarah, who has a headache, when asked about going home; says to the school nurse, “Call my Mom, but she gave me Motrin this morning, and just sent me to school.”
School Age Strategies Waiting to read a story before the kids fell asleep, I waited for Zack to stop emoting over being caught for something he did to Tyler. Soon he began crying and saying the kids at school were mean to him and we were mean to him and always making fun of him. Heaving breaths and tears and deep depressing moans droned out of his mouth. While this is going on, Tyler goes into his room and gets a book, “Bart Simpsons Guide To Life”. He opens it up to the page on “How to stay up past your bedtime” and points to “Stall by relaying horrible events that took place in school that day”!!! Once I started laughing, even Zack forgot what he was crying about and started laughing.
Sarah’s third grade class made chocolate and peanut butter candy for a fundraiser. Sarah said, “We made six hundred and seventy bags. There were two in each bag so we made…how many did we make mommy?” “Thirteen hundred and forty pieces of candy,” Kim answered. “But mom, before you said we made over a thousand.”
Kim and the boys were on the side of the highway with a flat tire. A friend happens to be driving down the highway in the opposite direction. She exits and then gets back on the highway to see if Kim needs help. As she pulls over in front of the stranded van, Kim and the boys notice who it is. Kim says, “Oh my god boys, it’s Michelle”, whereby Tyler says “does she have a flat tire too?”