A few nights ago during one of our many “I don’t want to sleep in my bed, I wanna sleep in your bed” episodes, I had a very interesting but heartwarming conversation with my son, Landen. I was trying to read my bible and both kids were still up and it may have been somewhere in the 9:00 hour. I was tired, and it didn’t seem like the kids were. At all. I closed my bible and said “do you know where all the things we have come from”? His answer was “uh huh from God”! I think my heart fluttered and skipped like a million beats! I suddenly had a burst of energy.
I mean I was literally excited at that point. Why? Because we’ve all been there, right? We have those moments as moms where we feel like we’re getting this parenting thing all wrong. Moments when you feel a little bit of guilt because you hand your kid the iPad or turn on some cartoon so that you can have a few minutes of quiet time. But in that moment I felt like I was getting something right! Saying our prayers, saying grace, and talking about God is paying off. Our son is absorbing the things that we are teaching him about God. Those things are important to us. Those things are the ones that we want to get right.
Shortly after that, I started talking about all the things we have, and how important it is to thank God for those things. I asked him to name some things that he wanted to thank God for. Of course, in three year old fashion, he answered with things like “my trains, our tv, my iPad, food”,and so on. I just smiled. I was thankful for that moment. Before I knew it, our prayers were all said, and he was asleep. IN MY BED. But I didn’t mind.
I thought about how over the years as both kids grow, the things that they’re thankful for will change from toys to things like life, and peace of mind.
As mentioned in my previous post, I enjoy making memories with my family. I enjoy starting our own little traditions and planning things for us to do. With Fall being the Season of Thanks, I wanted to do something to start teaching our son how important it is to be thankful for everything, even small things. November 1st, we started our gratitude jar. Everyday, we each say something that we’re thankful for, write it down, and slip it into the jar. This will be our family tradition every year starting on November 1st through the end of the month. Each jar will be labeled by the year, and I can’t wait to compare what Landen and Ava (only 4 months currently) are thankful for at 2 and 5 to what they’re thankful for at 6 and 9, and years later as they’re older. This was one of the items on our bucket list that I’m happy to have checked off. We want them to understand how important it is to be grateful for everything, not just “things”, and to know that there’s always something to be thankful for. We want our kids to know that it’s important to be grateful for things like sunshine, for smiles, and love! And we can’t wait until they’re able to understand those concepts. I’m forever grateful for our little conversation that night!
