Intentional Parenting

M.O.P.S. has started back up for the year! I picked Morgan up from childcare this morning and he was riding the rocking horse... with someone's pink blanket. They told me that he wouldn't give it up. That's how he is. He is totally glued to his night night. This one wasn't his. But, it had the same texture.

Today's speaker was Amy Gill with Once Upon a Family and the topic was intentional mothering. She talked about how today's families are frantic and frazzled. We know what we want to do for our families but often reality falls short of the fairytale image we hold on to. But, it's not about doing more, it's about doing less and doing the right things. Intentional mothering means that our actions are deliberate. She encouraged us to think about things that we can do once a day, once a year and once in a while to be better moms and better for our marriage.

We also talked about great traditions to build for our children. I'm especially interested in doing this for my family

Here's what I'd like to do intentionaly for my family:

Once a Day:

Make my son and husband laugh

Tell my son and husband that I love them

Eat a meal together

Always spend 30 minutes of one-on-one uninterrupted play time with my son

Once a Week:

Have a date night with my husband

Once a Month:

Have father/son night with Morgan when he is old enough

Game night here at the house

Once a Year & Holiday Traditions:

Have at least one overnight stay just with my husband. Have the entire evening and morning at a special get-away.

Make an ornament each year

Drive and look at the Christmas lights

Make laminated placemats with photo Christmas cards from friends and family

Attend Gaby's Christmas tea

Wrap Christmas books and upwrap one each night to read

Make a handprint for Morgan each year at the craft barn in Colorado

Make Christmas cookies

Write a letter each year for Morgan and give all 21 letters to him on his 21st b-day. I've already put the reminder in Outlook to do on New Year's.

Decorate for Valentine's day and have a family dinner

See the fireworks each year for 4th of July.

Do the Easter Egg Hunt

Pumpkin Patch at Halloween

Ride the hay ride in Colorado

Use the free tickets to the state fair

Morgan hunt with Dan for dove and deer opening season

Publish this blog into a book

I'm sure more ideas will come to mind. Let me know your great ideas too! I love traditions!

First Day of School!

School is here and Morgan handled it like a champ! Here he is with his lunchbox and curious George. He has a huge lunch cooler with two ice packs. It's a little heavy for him. So, he has to drag it. Morgan had fish sticks, vegetables and strawberries for his first school lunch. It was almost like he's been waiting for this day. He made a mad dash for the door.
Then, my sweet child actually pushed me out of the way to get into the classroom. He's in the tulip class with Mrs. Michelle and Mrs. Dee.
No tears. Morgan was so thrilled to go to school.
Benjamin is in his classroom this year. He was sad. His mom, Melissa, did a great job. Jennifer and I watched him for a little bit while she hung back out of sight.

The first day of school flew by! I thought that I would have tons of time and get a bunch of projects done. I ended up spending the entire time grocery shopping, working on bills and budget spreadsheets. It was an amazing experience to grocery shop without a child! Where did the time go? I'll have to postpone breaking down the aquarium and cleaning everything out until his next day on Friday. Fun!

Happy 18 Months!

Morgan turned 18 months old yesterday. Today is the first day of his MDO program. I've been up since 5am. My sweet little baby is going to school today! Here are 18 precious things about Morgan in honor of achieving 18 months.

1. It's so precious that you are a man's man. Morgan makes a bee-line for any man in the room. It's almost like you can see that he wants to be just like them and imitate them. He's going to be Dan's perfect little golfing and hunting sidekick.
2. You're still sucking that thumb.
3. You will tell us, "night night" if you are super tired. You are getting to be such a great little communicator.
4. You are a lover... such a sweet sweet soul. You love to hug your friends and stuffed animals. Yesterday we bought your Elmo costume for Halloween and you hugged and hugged it. (It has a giant stuffed Elmo head on it.)
5. You want to figure things out so badly. It's precious watching your frustration when you can't make something do something you want it to do. You'll get there baby! Your mind is just working faster than your strength and your dexterity.
6. You're fast! You can get to an open toilet in about half a second! How did you go from an immobile blob to speedy Gonzales?
7. You are opinionated. You can rarely be tricked into eating something if you don't like a food.
8. You have such a good memory! I'm already amazed at how quickly you pick up and remember things.
9. You want to be like Mom. How cute you are! I guess that my black calculator does look like my phone. You held it up to your ear and babbled into it for almost our entire grocery shopping trip yesterday.
10. You dance on command. Now, that's just cute!
11. You aren't shy. I can take you anywhere and you are ready to be the life of the party.
12. Water baby! I had to turn my face away to keep from laughing in your face when you threw a fit in the bathtub when the water drained out. You laid your entire naked body face down to try to get the last bit.
13. You are such a great little discoverer. Now you are figuring things out and running to either come show me or grab my hand and bring me to whatever you want to show me.
14. I heard you snore the other day. It was ever so quiet. I love listening to you breathe.
15. You are getting to be more flexible. We were able to go until 12:30 for your nap yesterday. You just switched to one nap a day! Freedom!
16. Your teeth are adorable. You have four on top, two on bottom and molars coming in. The next bottom 2 incisors are also starting to make an appearance.
17. You are a sweet kisser. I can ask for a kiss and you pucker up your mouth and make the smoochy kissing sound.
18. You are my little pal. I love spending time with you!

Good luck on your first day of school today baby!

Long Time, No Blog!

I know that I haven’t written in a while. I think that sometimes when I have so much that has to be written that I put it off to do all at once. We were gone for 2 weeks in Colorado and I have a million photos and videos to sift through! I promise that I plan to get right on that next week.

Morgan starts his Mother's Day Out program next week. I am soooooo excited! He will attend twice a week. Last night Dan and I went to meet the teacher night. He has 3 teachers in his room, a music teacher and a gross motor skills teacher. Their schedule is packed with lots of things in about 15 minute incriments. Toddlers have such short attention spans!

My friend Amy sent me one of those forwards that has a bunch of questions. You read your friends answers and then answer back with your own. One of the questions was, when was the last time that you cried. I feel like I’m always crying when I hear moving music. Nichole Nordeman has several songs that I love to cry to. Sometimes you just need a few tears to put things in perspective. I love her song Legacy. I feel exactly the way the song describes. I want to leave my own legacy. I guess that I look at Morgan as my legacy, and look forward to pouring everything into him. Check out the video.



Her song Holy makes me bawl.

Did I mention that I also cry at a particular IAMS dog food commercial.