GREAT ADVICe

It is no coincidence the way that God's timing works! I was sent this article by one of my best friends at a time I needed it most! Our family is loving so many things about our new life in Owensboro but there are a lot of things that we are missing as well and there is an unexpected adjustment period that I didn't think would be so hard. I want my children to feel secure and right now we have had so many changes I think all of us are holding on a little tight to each other! I know it will get easier and get better with each day, each week that we continue to make Owensboro our home but this article was wonderful and just for a tiny moment removed my "mom guilt" just for a little while :)

Trust your instincts. If you think you will feel better buying the baby monitor with the TV screen, then do it. But if you realize it will lead to obsessing about whether or not the baby is breathing, then don’t. If someone tells you your baby looks flushed and you disagree, you are probably right.


2. Trust your kids. If they indicate they are ready for grown-up forks and deciding for themselves how much toilet paper to use, then they probably are. If they make a mistake, help them learn from it and move on. You knew that someday they would grow up, you don’t want to be pouring the milk for a 12 year old anyway, do you?

3. Don’t be a single parent unless that is your official classification. My husband is a 100% parent and so am I. He takes care of poop accidents, he makes ponytails, he cooks, he laces shoes. Not every day, not every time. But neither do I. But between the two of us, it gets done. Having a good Dad makes you a good Mom, and vice versa.
4. Talk it out. Talk to your kids. Talk to your spouse. Life is a battlefield and you need a plan. If you wander through life, then you will get nowhere. But if you have some sort of plan or purposeful response to a parenting situation, you will do better. After a troublesome day, BAGD and I often talk about ideas for next time. How can we reduce Geetle’s sassy talk; maybe we should implement a reward system. How can we keep Pookie from accidentally dressing himself out of Geetle’s side of the closet; maybe we should hang a scarf on the closet rod to separate the sides.
5. Don’t be too hard on yourself. If making cupcakes for preschool is fun for you, do it. But if its not, then buy them at the grocery store. Parenting magazines are great for ideas, but NO ONE can possibly do all those crafts, made-up backyard games, finger puppet plays and funny face veggie pizzas. By my estimation, the average Mom (who is probably also a “good mom”) does less than 5% of the things in the magazine. Your kids would love a funny-face pizza, sure. But they would rather have you spray them with the garden hose or listen to their 10 minute story about the pile of dirt behind the fence at preschool.
6. Your kids are part of your life, your whole life. I take my kids to the grocery store, Jiffy Lube, the bank, and Great Grandma Jones’ antique-saturated home. If you learn to integrate your kids into your normal everyday life, you will get to spend more time with them, you will teach them how to behave in different situations and you will be able to get all the necessary tasks of life done.
7 . Try to be organized. This can be a hard one, but it really makes a difference. When your physical surroundings are chaotic, so is your mind. At the bare minimum, organize the parts of your life that directly affect your parenting. I have a giant box of household papers that I know I will never file; I stuff them in the sump pump closet in the basement. But, my the closet my b/g twins share is organized by gender and type of clothing. I have hundreds of recipe clippings that I stuff into a folder, making them useless. But, we keep our 25+ piece Mr. PotatoHead set all together in a lidded plastic box with his picture taped to the side.
8.¬† Keep your sense of humor.¬† Stepping in poop that fell out of someone’s droopy pull-up is funny.¬† Explaining why some peepees have hair on them is funny.¬† Realizing that someone let the hamster out is funny.¬† Cutting a patch of maple syrup-encrusted hair out of your daughter’s ponytail 5 minutes before the bus comes is funny. ¬† Hearing your son belt out “Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy” at the top of his lungs at the bank to hear the echo is funny. ¬†¬† You might not realize it immediately, but its true.¬† If you don’t think so, try telling one of your stressful parenting stories to the Grandpa and see if he laughs.¬† If he laughs, its funny.
9.¬† You reap what you sow.¬† Screamers beget screamers.¬†¬† Whiners beget whiners.¬† Do you know why Geetle listens to me when I tell her to pick up her toys?¬† Because I listen to her when she tells me her theory on why car tires have silver stars in the middle (hubcaps).¬†¬† Why is Pookie willing to sit still in the doctor’s waiting room?¬† Because I sit quietly and cuddle with him on the couch at home.¬†
10.¬† Let your first thought and consideration when making any decision or action be “what about my kids?”¬† Really, if you do this one, you can skip all the other rules you read here or in any parenting book.¬†¬† This is the silver bullet of good mothering.¬†