As4Me » In the Car and on the Go

Seeing Our Deficiencies, Or Putting the Bible to Work

Michelle — Fri, 18 Nov 2011 09:17:41 +0000

On the way home from church the other night, on a whim, I asked the children, “What verse would you think about if you were having a hard time being kind to your sister or brother?”

The children were all stymied. “Children obey your parents”? We talked about some better possibilities.

Then I asked, “Can you think of a Scripture that reminds us about something good that God has done?”

Again, the answers came, but they were slow. It was interesting to me that although they have many verses of God’s Word memorized, they aren’t as skilled seeing the connection between “real life” and the Bible as I would expect. Especially since we talk about certain verses like “Be ye kind one to another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another” on a daily basis.

After a short lull, my David (!) asked for more questions like this, and I asked some more.

What should I read if I am discouraged?

What should I read if my brother or sister is mean to me?

I tried to ask questions that related to verses that I knew were fresh in their minds. It was fun, and I want to do it again.

What I learned was that I need to do better at getting my children to draw on their knowledge. I am too quick to give the answers, give the verses, throughout my days. It was a good reminder that I need to cut back on lectures. I think I can at least ask a few questions before I give the answers, don’t you think?

I’ll keep you posted.Similar Posts:

Catching Up

Michelle — Mon, 31 Jan 2011 13:52:13 +0000

Happy Day, but lots to do.

Lee’s grandma passed away a little more than a week ago, so we flew to Oregon for the funeral and to spend time with our extended family. It was a good trip. As usual, I notice more clearly my own parenting faults when my children are in public more and I want them to behave. Being with family helps me to know better how to pray for them. Since Lee came home a few days before I did, I had the opportunity of traveling alone with my children. I noticed that I was more fearful of dealing with the rental car than any other part of the trip, only because I had never done it before. Other than struggling for 10 minutes to get the car seat out, it was easy. I need to remember this when I’m helping my children deal with fear of the unknown.

Come to think of it, God knew too, that I wouldn’t have to deal with the “advanced screeners” and pat-downs at the airport, something else I was worried about. Much to thank the Lord for.

Now we’re all home. There’s groceries to buy and laundry to do, school for the kids. Lee is on call tonight, so my day is longer than normal to get things done. First, I need to make my coffee and read my Bible.Similar Posts:

Teaching Giving and Receiving

Michelle — Fri, 24 Dec 2010 10:30:23 +0000

Christmas is a great time to teach children about giving and receiving gifts, about selfishness and loving others. Some years I do better at making worthwhile gifts with the children to give to others. Other years, I feel like all my good intentions simmered in a pot but never left it (say, “child under 18 months”). In eleven years of marriage, I’ve never yet managed to have a family photo sent out with a charming Christmas letter, although several years I’ve actually written letters, and some years I’ve ordered pictures. (If you didn’t get one, don’t worry, because nobody else did either!)

This year we made some gifts, and let the children earn money to spend on other gifts (we overpay them, but they don’t realize that yet). Tonight as we were driving home from visiting daddy at the hospital, I asked them if they could tell me why we give gifts at Christmas time.

One child mentioned the wise men who brought gifts to Jesus. One brought up that Jesus was a gift. I asked what made Jesus a gift. They really didn’t know how to explain it, so I helped a bit by explaining that Jesus coming to earth as a baby was part of God’s plan to provide salvation.

I asked them how they hoped their family and friends would respond when they opened their gifts. Then I asked whether they would feel bad if someone opened a gift they bought and said, “I don’t want this gift” and didn’t take it. They all agreed that would be terrible. (I need to tell them about the time I did exactly that when I was five.)

I told them that God offers his gift of salvation. When we say, “Not now,” we’re saying “I don’t want this gift” to God.

I decided that giving gifts is a good time to talk about salvation, too.Similar Posts:

Fighting in the Car

Michelle — Fri, 16 Jul 2010 12:18:56 +0000

I noticed a week or so ago a new pattern of behavior in the car.

David and Bethel sit together in the back. By and large, they get along well, and they tend to resolve their conflict when they are irritated with each other.

Lately, though, they’ve developed this entertainment that is basically poking each other until somebody is unhappy and yells stoppit. It’s not one child tormenting the other. Both children do their share of poking, and they both know how to push their sibling to the end of their tolerance levels. It is distracting and unpleasant behavior, and even though they claim the poking is fun, it really isn’t. Moreover, I really don’t want to develop wrestling habits between my son and daughter.

I’ve been trying to decide how to handle this. Should I separate these two? Start handing out consequences for wrestling and teasing? How do I prevent them from forming habits of behavior that may cause them grief later on? These are good questions, but I see now that they were focused on finding a solution, not motives and contributing factors.

Lee noticed first that the problem seemed to be boredom; so he suggested that I read to the children when we’re all in the car. As we suspected, the children are much better behaved when they are listening to a story. That works well when we’re all together.

I can’t read and drive at the same time, though. I’ve been trying to pay better attention to when they’re disruptive in the car, and how I can respond by giving their minds something to do.

I’ve noticed that when I take the time to engage in conversation with them, they are better behaved. I’ve been consciously getting them to sing with me. Playing common travel games works too, anything that makes them think. I want to help them understand why they are happier when they’re not bored. We’ll see how they do.Similar Posts:

No More Monkeys Jumping on the Bed

Michelle — Fri, 29 May 2009 04:13:09 +0000

I’m rethinking our tradition of allowing jumping on the beds in hotels.

Awhile back, I heard of someone doing that, and I thought it was a fun way of discouraging jumping on the bed at home (which to be honest, has never been a large problem). We don’t let them jump on the bed for two reasons. First, their bed slats are wood, and jumping can damage the beds. Second, jumping on the bed unsupervised can be dangerous (not just on a bunk bed, although two of three beds are up high). We’ve given both reasons when discussing why we don’t jump on beds. But on our infrequent trips, they always remember to jump on the hotel beds.

Here’s the problem. I want them to respect other people’s property. I don’t want them thinking that we must be good stewards of what God has given us personally (their toys, our furniture, our house, etc.), but that other people’s belongings don’t matter. When we borrow something, or use something that belongs to someone else, we are responsible for it. That’s why we should take special care of library books (I’m feeling convicted, since this very moment I’ve got thirty strewn hither and yon). That’s why we return a borrowed car with a full tank of gas. It’s why we replace something if we damage it. And even though hotel beds are made strong, that’s why they won’t be jumping on them in the future.

It will be a good discussion.

Similar Posts:

Vacations and Godliness

Michelle — Thu, 26 Jun 2008 10:00:28 +0000

I found an excellent article on family vacations. It was written to fathers and husbands, but I found it quite challenging for myself. We spend much time preparing for a vacation: oil changed, laundry, house cleaned, finding ways to keep the children happy on a road trip. How about spending time preparing spiritually for the vacation?

Am I looking to be served on vacation? Will I remember that sin does not ever go on vacation, and prepare accordingly? Will I consider others’ desires more important than my own desires? Am I preparing myself for the challenge that I usually find in spending time reading my Bible when I’m away from home? Am I praying about how I will live out the gospel while I am gone?

Guess I should get to work!Similar Posts:

Driving Home on a Sunday

Michelle — Mon, 14 Jan 2008 05:35:51 +0000

Once again we drove home from California on a Sunday. I lost my purse, and we spent Saturday trying to find it with no success. So we packed up and left extra early Sunday morning, just in time to get to church in Phoenix suburbs. Last time we did this and found that it gave the children a good long break in the middle of the trip.

It’s not just for the break, though. We stop at church while we’re traveling because we want to communicate to our children the importance of the local church. We do this first by avoiding travel on Sundays, if possible. We attend services somewhere when we are out of town, and when we go camping, we come back for Sunday church. And times like today, when we really couldn’t avoid traveling when we did, we timed our trip around the services of a church we know. (Like this morning: we left at 4:00am; It’s hard leaving this early cheerfully, I can assure you.)

Practically, the children are nervous going into a new place, and the baby sometimes cries when I leave her in the nursery (although I usually tell the nursery workers to get me if she cries for more than five minutes). But I think our children are more flexible than we give them credit for. It helps significantly when we are able to tell them ahead of time what to expect, as much as we know. And we present it in a positive way, which so far works just fine. We have had a few times on the road where a child wants to stay with us during the services, something we allow if they behave.

It’s not a test of spirituality, of course. There are other choices we could have made, and sometimes it is not possible to stop during a trip like this. In a variety of ways, parents communicate what they value. But this is one way we’ve chosen to communicate something we value very much.Similar Posts:

Getting Left Out

Michelle — Sun, 06 Jan 2008 05:47:32 +0000

Yesterday I noticed Bethel was getting clingy and irritable, and today I figured out why. David is her best friend, and the past week, he’s not played with her at all. Even though the cousins do play with her some, most of their games don’t interest her or make sense to her. I think she was feeling a bit lost.

So today I tried to spend a little more time with her. We read some books, I talked with her and held her. We played with her ponies. I think that helped. The cousins left today, so Bethel will have her brother back. Sometimes I miss these things. I wish I had been more sensitive to this earlier.Similar Posts:

What’s Different at Grandma’s House?

Michelle — Sat, 05 Jan 2008 18:01:17 +0000

One of the things that Lee and I talked briefly about is the difference between parenting at home, and parenting at Grandma’s house with cousins all around.

For one, our children watch more TV, play on the computer more, and play video games. They’ve done more of these activities in a week than they normally do in several months. Assuming there is no bad content, is this activity change a bad thing?

We have also noticed that we don’t interact with our children as much. This might be because the children are more occupied, but it also might be because we’re more preoccupied. Maybe it’s a little of both. David and Bethel are playing with their cousins outside or up in the attic playroom most of the time. The children (except Laurel) eat with the other young children, and we eat in the dining room. Consequently, there are far fewer opportunities to obey or disobey. That’s not exactly true with Laurel, who is one. She isn’t quite able to play with Stephen (age 2) without frequent conflict, so we do have to watch her more carefully.

Now, we do direct them all as parents. We have to direct them to get ready in the morning. We intervene when there is a sharing dispute. We help Laurel “come” when she is called. We help David go to sleep, although usually he’s ready to drop by the time the cousins go to sleep (and because all the older cousins sleep in the playroom it doesn’t make sense to put him to bed earlier). Taking naps is very hard for David, since he needs them here, and his cousins don’t. Bethel’s biggest struggle is when she has a conflict with Stephen or Laurel, but other than that, she plays on her own or follows her older cousins around (and they’re remarkably sweet and patient with a youngun tagging along). Laurel’s biggest struggle is her desire to take books off the bookshelves here. I haven’t done much except take them away (and I haven’t made it clear that she shouldn’t be taking them out), so maybe I should be dealing with this better.

For the older children, the discipline of choice here is separation from the cousins or the activity, and it seems to be quite effective. Just now Bethel pushed Laurel away when Laurel tried to take a bike away, and so I had Bethel sit on the couch while Laurel played with the bike. David became angry with Jon because he wouldn’t let Tommy play a video game, and as a consequence he was not allowed to be in the playroom watching them play video games.

I’ll have to think a little more. I’d really like to turn the parenting role off, and that’s probably not a good thing. But I think it’s okay to parent less. The question to think and pray about is knowing the difference.Similar Posts:

Children Behaving in Public

Michelle — Sat, 01 Dec 2007 11:14:24 +0000

One of the great opportunities of travel is that you get a good idea of your strengths and weaknesses in how you are parenting. You see where you need more work, and where your instruction is paying off. Sometimes it is humiliating. Sometimes it is a time for giving thanks.

Today I took the children out for breakfast without Lee (he’s in meetings all day, and we’re in a small hotel room. Last time we tried this was in St. Louis about nine months ago, and it was one of those humiliating experiences. David whined, Bethel ran away, and Laurel alternately cried and threw on the ground anything within reach. Today was much better. They all colored. They ate politely. In fact, I’m the only one who spilled anything. They didn’t shout all that much. While I was paying, they sat quietly on nearby chairs (I held Laurel).

When we got in the car, mommy prayed (out loud) and told God thank you for my three children who glorified God by their good behavior.

They’re not perfect. I’ve seen areas I need to work on, quickly! But this morning was a blessing and encouragement.Similar Posts: