The Little Girl In Pink Shoes

     It had been a fast-paced, breath catching, agonizingly long day. I had worked a 10 hr. shift and now I was at the store shopping for groceries for tomorrow, with housework and meal preparation waiting at home for me.

   I was tired. As I got into line at the check-out register, I noticed a little girl sitting perched in the cart. This tiny toddler flashed me a whimsical smile as she swung her legs back and forth. Blonde ponytails bounced against her shoulder.

   Her parents were busy chatting to her, and to each other as they pulled things from their cart to put on the conveyors belt.

   A little balloon with flowers caught the little girl's attention and she pointed at it, making her request known to her parents.

   Her mom smiled, "You already had a balloon for your Birthday!"

   The little girl shook her head solemnly. "It broken."

   "You mean that it fell off its stem," chimed in her father, "It is okay, you still have the balloon."

   The little girl became more insistent, "I want the balloon."

   In effort to distract her, her mother said, "You got brand new shoes today, aren't they cute?"

   Apparently, their young daughter was in agreement for she swung her feet again and admired the shoes that were glimmering pink with little bows at the top. "Pretty shoes," she chirped to herself. She looked up at her parents that had returned the business at hand of purchasing their selected items. "My pretty shoes," she said again, obviously hoping to garnish an equally enthusiastic response. Her parents made no response. She watched them a moment and then began looking around. Her eyes met mine and she smiled brightly all the while pointing to her new footwear. "My shoes. Look!"

   At this, both parents turned to see who their daughter was talking to.

   I smiled at the little girl and nodded. My demure response only seemed to encourage her. "Pretty shoes." She beckoned me, "Come see."

   Her parents exchanged half amused, half embarrassed smiles that their daughter was conversing a with a complete stranger. Her mother tried to salvage the situation but chattering brightly about her pretty and pink the shoes were, but the little girl was still looking at me. "Come see my shoes," she called again, her cheeks growing plump with another smile.

   I stepped forward and bent to look at the shoes, "They are beautiful! What a pretty pink, and look! They have beautiful bows too."

   The little girl grinned back at me, and smiles had replaced any previous signs of embarrassment on her parents' faces.

   They departed then, the little girl waving good-bye.

   I looked after them reflectively. This young child had been joyous over the gift that her parents had given her, and she had wanted to share that joy with others. It made me realize how important it is to share the good gifts that our Heavenly Father gives us. with others. We shouldn't be quiet and keep to ourselves something that could bring peace and happiness to others.

   I just want to encourage my readers, to share their joys with others. It really is a simple, and encouraging gesture.

   I will close now, but once again, I want to thank you for reading. Have a blessed day!

The Small Things

   Stopping to smell the roses, making time for the small things: these give a special meaning to life. In our fast paced world, it is hard to make time to slow down and just enjoy the moment. When this happens, God will sometimes bring something along to give you that moment to appreciate the simple joys of life.

   One summer morning, I was going to yard sales with my mom and younger sister. I was trying to budget so I was just tagging along. We had made several stops and few purchases. Then we stopped at one particular sale.

   A little lemonade stand was set up, and a little girl along with her younger brother were trying to sell lemonade. The little boy approached several potential customers, extending a cup of lemonade in hopeful expectation. Person after person turned him down.

   At last the little boy turned to me. “Would you like a cup of lemonade for 50 cents?”

   I dug into my wallet and handed him a dollar. “Can I have two?”

   His eyes widened and he eagerly pushed the cup into my hand and raced back to his sister calling for another cup and telling her to hurry. The flurry of breathless excitement put a smile on my face the rest of day. Instead of just making their day, they had made mine.

   I encourage you to make time for the small things. In doing so, you will meet with blessings along the way.

Take Your Time...

   Many times we rush through work and try to get the list of things we have to do, checked off.  It is good to be quick and efficient, but sometimes we need to remember not to rush through things.

    Doubtless most of you have a child, or younger sibling that you tell, "First work and then play."

     With the promise of play more often then not, the student races through their work and you end up with a mass of scribbles, wrong answers, and sloppy work.  Of course then, is the prospect of re-doing it again.

    I always tell my students that if you don't have time to do it right the first time, you must have time to do it right the second time.

    The Bible says:

     "And whatsoever ye do, do it heartily, as to the Lord, and not unto men;"  -  Colossians 3:23

     It is important for children to understand at an early age that when they undertake to do something, they should do the very best they can, 'or why do it?'.  If it is important enough to start, it is doubly important to finish.

    So I encourage you, even if your child or sibling groan about having to re-do their work, continue stressing to them how important that they do things right the first time so that they do not have to do second.  Blessing!

-Sharron

Frustration & Learning

     Learning new things can sometimes be hard, and if that is the case, frustrations are bound to occur.

    How do you know if your child is frustrated?  Usually children will whine, cry, pout, get angry, or just shut off completely and refuse to do work.

     How do you prevent frustrations?  Sometimes frustrations are unavoidable, but there are some measure that can be taken to prevent them from getting out of control.

    Recognize when your child is getting frustrated, or when you are getting frustrated.  Take a break, go over flash cards do some physical exercises, get a drink or snack, read a short story, etc.

     Raising your voice, scolding, or rushing the lesson will only be a source of further frustration to yourself and your student.

    I have learned that each student has their rate of learning and a certain level of work that they are able to complete in a time period.  One child may not struggle with the same things that another child is, or they may complete more work in a short period of time.  Since I have been homeschooling some of my younger siblings, teaching, and tutoring; I realize that we need to learn each child's strengths and weaknesses.

    If you are a mom who is homeschooling you already have a head start.  You know what interests, motivates, encourages, discourages, or frustrates your child.  More often than not, you know some of their strengths and weaknesses.  Form your lessons based on these observations.  You probably notice that each child has a certain attention span or may work better at a certain time of day.

    The important thing is to be patient with them and yourself.  If you are getting stressed, even though they are not, take a break!  Frustrations have a way of spreading from one person to another.  Keep hydrated and reward yourself and your student when a difficult task is complete: a piece of chocolate, special meal or snack, extra playtime, etc.  Just keep a positive attitude and give sufficient time for difficult tasks.  :)

    It is also important to realize that we get frustrated as well, but unlike children we can usually manage our emotions to keep from being too overwhelmed.
 
    What about you?  Do you have some positive teaching strategies when addressing frustrations?  What are some methods of reward, or how do you identify their rate and capabilities of learning?  We'd love to hear from you.  Just type your comments below.  God bless you!

Sibling Rivalry

     Sibling rivalry.  Or in other terms... competition.  Bad or good?  Well, that depends on the motives and attitudes involved, but really, who doesn't like a little friendly competition?

    I have three younger siblings and I would be lying if I said we never competed.  Ever since I can remember, there was always some type of competition going on: who could run fastest, drink the most water, win the race to the top of the stairs.  There were arm wrestling competitions, a competition on who the loudest was, or a contest to see who could hold their breath under water longest.  To be honest, I won most of them.  This makes sense because not only was I the oldest, I had more motivation: a younger sibling besting the older?  I would never hear the end of it.

     Now that most of us have passed our teenage years, we compete with each other less.  Each of us have found our own special niches in the family which was probably determined through sibling rivalry.  Not the best artist?  Two choices: work harder, or find something else to do that others were not as interested in.  Those of us with siblings are really blessed, because as an only child we are less likely to be introduced into various interests.

     My twin sister has her own 3-D printer where she prints plastic objects like decor.  She is a good gardener and she likes sci-fi a bit.

     My brother is our very own computer geek, entrepreneur, and accomplished musician.

     And my youngest sister is an excellent baker, flower gardener, sportsy person.

    So where did I fit in?  I like to garden, but it definitely is not my first choice.  I bake, but my specialty is limited to pies and cobblers.  I am tech savvy to some extent, but I use this intelligence for blogging rather than figuring out the stock market, and would have never thought of owning a 30D printer... I'm also not to great at sports.

    Now, my confession.  I probably could master each of these things as my siblings have but I doubt I would enjoy it as they seem to.  I am the artist among my sibling group, the authoress, the Sunday School teacher, and an aspiring dulcimer player.

    If you are worried about too much sibling competition among your clan, I'd advise you not to (unless of course someone is suffering because of it).  Siblings push us to find what we are good at and to earn our place in the family, so to speak.  Sure, I lost the arm wrestling competitions with my brother as he got older, but he had earned the place in my life as a protector.  My two sisters may have passed me up concerning gardening and athletic skills, but it is fun to have them on my side or eat the fruit of their labor.  Each sibling has their own unique personality, and just because someone says rivalry does not mean sibling fights (though my siblings and I occasionally fought).

    So, what are your thoughts?  Do you deal with sibling rivalry?  Has it pushed you to try new things that you might not have otherwise?  Do you have advice on how to deal with sibling rivalry when it gets out of hand?  I'd love to hear from you!

    Until then, God bless you and thank you for reading.

Perfect Tops

    Most of us want perfection, few of us are willing to work hard enough to reach it.

    Recently, I was working on a craft with some younger children.  We were making spinning tops.  The children got their pieces of wood and set to work coloring.  After putting the wooden pin in the center, they had fun spinning them.

    More children arrived and also wanted to create their own homemade top.  One of the children announced, "It doesn't even matter how you color it.  It looks nice when you spin it."

    It was true, no matter how they colored it, the blur of motion always blended the colors perfectly.  Still, one little boy looked up from where he had carefully been coloring his, and replied, "I am coloring it so that it still looks nice, even when it is not spinning."  The lessons you can learn from children!

    Sometimes we are too busy pretending to be perfect and acting perfect, that we don't realize that we should really be spending time becoming perfect.  We also have to realize that we cannot be perfect on our own, but that it is God makes us perfect.

 2 Samuel 22:33   God is my strength and power: and he maketh my way perfect. 

Memories

     Sometimes, we don't undertake projects or certain activities with our children because it will be "too messy".

     I understand.  If you are going to repaint the living room, it might be better to wait until the toddler is down for a nap; or if company will be arriving any minute and you really need to get the cake into the oven, you might do the stirring yourself.

    I am however, a big advocate of including children in the current family project.  Yes, there are some days where I am in a hurry, or that I really don't want another mess to clean up.  Some days, I have to make time.  No one really likes messes, or the cleaning involved that takes place after them.  But when children are making messes, they are learning.

    That is not to say that I am encouraging a child to dump the small potted plant sitting on my counter, but guaranteed, they'll learn something: not do to it again.

    Sometimes, it is hard to let go of that dream that with 3+ toddlers, your house in never going to be quite immaculate.  And if you are anything like me, toys scattered across the bedroom floor or an overturned chair is bound to irk you.  Sometimes, we have to overlook the mess and realize that they are making memories.

     Toddlers and children in general are interested in just about anything you are currently doing.  I think God put this interest there, because He wants them to learn from us.  Truly, they learn so much!  And their eyes are always watching.

     Yesterday, I had my group of toddlers all diaper changed and ready for an afternoon of outside time.  It had rained all the day prior and also that morning, but the sun had finally come out.  I quickly straightened the room, announcing as I did so, that we were going outside.  Some of them were too young to understand, so they ignored me and took out another toy from the shelf.

     On my to pick up a child, I almost tripped over a little boy who was holding someone's shoe is his hand.  "Shoe, Shoe, Shoe!" he kept saying, and I paused long enough to see that he was following one of his friends that had lost a shoe.  When she finally sat down, he hopped over to her and began to help her put the shoe back on.  He couldn't quite do it by himself so I lent him a hand.  After we were finished he proudly stood up and said, "Yay!  Now, outside!"

    The lesson didn't stop there.  He saw another one of the children who had previously ignored me and he went and tapped him on the shoulder.  "Outside."  He then promptly took the toy the child was playing with, shelved it, and proceeded to stand patiently by the door.  Considering that this boy is not yet two, I found it really impressive!

    In this one incident, it showed that he knew several things.

1.  We put our shoes on before we go outside.
2.  We all go outside together.
3.  We have to put away our toys before we move on to another activity.
4.  We go outside, when we are all standing by the door.
5.  It will go faster if I help!

    This was one of the highlights of my day!  :)  His sweet helpfulness made me smile and realize that after weeks and months of modeling this for them, he had observed, learned, and acted.

    What about you?  Do you have any similar stories?  Have your toddlers or children surprised you with the unexpected knowledge that they learned from you?  I'd love to hear about it!  As always, God bless you and thanks for reading.