We’ve all heard it before but one of the most effective tools we have in teaching our kids about anything is to first be the example. We can tell our kids to do something, but unless they see you doing it, the chances of them taking it upon themselves to follow-suit is slim (especially as they get older). I don’t want to focus just on the negative: yes in order for your children to not smoke, not swear or not engage in disobedient behavior is to not do it either, but I want to focus on the positive, esp. when it comes to teaching our children how to walk with the Lord.

Teaching children scripture and basic biblical principles is incredibly important and essential to the building blocks of their faith – I do not want to discount that. But what I feel is more important is how YOU are working out your faith in front of your children. My parents tried but it didn’t hold water and as an adult I found myself floundering as to how to walk with the Lord. I was never taught how to study the scriptures, I was never encouraged to pray and to learn to pray by just the simple act of praying and I wasn’t affirmed in how important it is to spend time getting to know the Lord.

We teach our children a lot of things through direct means, but sometimes the things that have the biggest impact on their lives are taught by indirect means. I encourage you to learn more about the spiritual disciplines and not only practice them alone, but in front of your children. This can have an amazing impact on your own personal walk with the Lord, but also teach your children how to live in relationship with Christ. One of the spiritual disciplines my husband and I participate in each week is silence and solitude. We decide the day and the time and then take turns so there is someone to watch the kids. We have been doing this for a few years now and when one of us leaves for our appointed time, our four year old will now say, “Have fun with Jesus!” He knows where I am going and what it’s purpose is: to spend time with my Savior. He also asks when will he be old enough to go with me (talk about encouraging my heart!). While his time of silence and solitude may look different than mine when he is old enough to practice it, the fact that he is seeing mommy and daddy do it, and what we share with him about our time is setting him up with the knowledge and the confidence to be a student of the Master.

Some ideas to try to easing yourself and your family into the spiritual disciplines:

Thanksgiving and Praise. Spend a few moments everyday thanking Jesus for the gifts he has given you. Let the kids share whatever they feel like, no matter how small or silly, and encourage them to thank Jesus with their hearts and also their voices. This can also lead your family in a time of worship. Worship is basically telling God who he is and that you’re happy about it. If singing worship songs is easier, than do that. But it can be as easy as simply saying “God is so good to us. He is an amazing Father!”

Prayer. Chances are you are already praying for your children, so now extend this practice into praying with your children. Kids are very eager to talk so as you pray together, encourage them to pray to God on their own. My four year used to resist this but each time we prayed I would tell him there is nothing that he can not tell God, that God loves him so much he’s just happy to talk with him. Now I will hear him talking in his bed before falling asleep at night and the next morning he’ll tell me he was talking to God all night long.

Rest. While practicing the Sabbath for some families is incredibly difficult (this is one that we have done and are trying to do again and each week we struggle at some point in the day), allotting time each week to spend together as a family encourages children to understand the resting aspect of the Sabbath. To stop moving at such a fast pace and enjoy being together as a family. This specific time can then spread into talking about or partaking in other spiritual disciplines.

Practicing the spiritual disciplines can transform your own walk with the Lord, but it can have far-reaching effects in the lives of your children. What a blessing it is for them to know how their parents strive to seek God, but also that you are teaching them how to do the same. To learn more about the spiritual disciplines, check out this encouraging and informative message by my husband. Of course I am partial, but it has some great information and counsel in it as well.

photo by melodramababs

My husband was out of town for three days this week. He went skiing with some of his family and friends. It wasn’t that hard on me. I like alone time, my kids go to bed early and the kids were exceptionally well-behaved. But when they heard Daddy open the front door, it was an all out stampede.

They jumped into his arms giggling, chattering and kissing and hugging.

I just said hello, grabbed my camera and started memorizing.

I am so thankful that God put two daddies in my life (my daddy and my husband) to show me and my children a small glimmer of what God the Father is like.

And I’m so thankful to our Heavenly Father who lavishes us with love.

How great is the love the Father has given us so freely!
Now we can be called children of God. 1 John 3:1

So you are no longer slaves, but God’s children; and since you are his children,
he has made you also heirs. Galatians 4:7

A father is tender and kind to his children. Psalm 103:13

Magnet Painting at Let’s Explore {every single post on this blog is fun and creative!}

Lord Have Mercy from the Other Mama {the funniest craft gone wrong story ever!}

Somebody Wants What You Have by Amy at The Finer Things {beautiful and hard-hitting!}

How to Homeschool with a Baby or a Toddler (and Enjoy It!) at Simple Homeschool {useful for any of us with little ones}

Homeschool Calendar and Morning Board with Homeschool Creations {you can adapt this to teach anything you want!  I love the Bible verse section!}

Please go read about Kristen’s life changing journey to Kenya with Compassion International, and then see how you can change a life, too.

Sponsored Child Lapbook by 1+1+1=1 {after reading all the Kenya trip reports from the Compassion bloggers, I am SO doing this for our kids!}

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And now, the moment you’ve all been waiting for: the winner of the Alphabet Crafts ebook is…{drumroll please}

JOLLY JOEY!

If you are not Jolly Joey, head over to No Time For Flash Cards‘ and download your own ebook. It’s only $8 and full of fun stuff for your kids!

The snow is gone and spring is teasing us with upper 60 degree temps and sweetly singing birds. Yesterday I took the kids to the park for a picnic and good spin around the playground. We were there for at least 2 hours. When it was almost time to go I gave Lydia ample warning: “We’ll be leaving in ten minutes.” and then, “Lydia, you can go down the slide two more times and then we’re leaving.” She was in the middle of playing with a new friend and did NOT want to leave. She walked up to me with a pouty look on her face. I bent down and said, “Lydia. What is Philippians 2:14?”

She said (slightly begrudgingly), “Do everything without complaining or arguing.” (<–I want to remember that voice forever!)

I replied, “OK. That means ‘leave the park without complaining or arguing.’ Now, go finish swinging and then say good-bye to your friend.”

She walked back to her friend, pushed the swing once or twice and when I said, “OK, let’s go!” She skipped happily to me and the car.

I kid you not.

I didn’t say anything right away. I got everyone buckled in, rolled down the windows and started driving. Then I said, “Lydia, do you know what happened back there? You wanted to disobey. But when you said God’s Word, your spirit got stronger! And you obeyed! How does that feel?”

Lydia: “Yaaaay! I was obedient! I love being obedient!! Yaaay!” (complete with leg kicks and squeals)

Again, I kid you not.

In these moments (which are not everyday, of course), I can almost see and feel that God’s Word is literally a sword. I can see how God’s Word is living and active! I’ve noticed on the days where I don’t remind Lydia of scripture and we don’t talk about God’s Word, that we all have a rougher day. Neither of us are easy to please. But when I take the first step and keep us BOTH in line with God’s Word, her actions respond to it. I can SEE the seeds of God’s Word growing in her life!

This is what God meant in Deuteronomy when he told us to talk about His commandments when we walk along the road and when we lay down and get up. We need a constant flow of conversation revolving around God’s Word.

Another thing that’s been helping us keep God’s Word at the forefront is books. (Remember Grandma’s Attic?) Well, I found two more short books about obedience that you might like. If I’m too upset to have a normal conversation, I like to pull these out at bed and naptimes. They are easy conversation starters on a child’s level.

Mommy, May I Hug the Fish?by Crystal Bowman

A little boy goes through his day with the constant question, “Mommy, May I…?” Sometimes she says yes and sometimes she says no. It’s a good book that reminds kids to not only ask before they act, but to obey.

Don’t Do That, Dexter by Jodee McConnaughhay

This book is a little more to the heart of the matter. Dexter is an imaginative, rambunctious little boy who disregards his parents warnings and then gets hurt or in trouble as a result. The best part of this book is that every page has a refrain, “Obey your parents in the Lord for this is right.” (Ephesians 6:1). So, Lydia has inadvertantly memorized that scripture.

This book is apparently not in print anymore but it looks like you can buy it for ONE PENNY from Amazon. So. Yeah. Buy it.

How do you keep God’s Word in the middle of your kids’ day?

photo by godogo

We made it! We got to the final Fruit of the Spirit! I can’t believe it. Next time I do a “unit”, I’m going to try to keep it under half a year! Sheesh.

As we’ve gone through this unit, I usually picked the fruit we’d focus on based on what was going on in our lives. That’s why self-control was first, we needed that most. Goodness seemed a little similar to the other fruits (kindness, love, etc.) so it became the last fruit I looked at. Therefore, it had no choice but to be lined up with a LIME, our very last scratch-and-sniff fruit! I could find no correlation for a lime=goodness. So, we’ll leave it at that.

SCRIPTURE

I picked a verse we already partially memorized around Halloween:

“In the same way, let your light shine before men, that they may see your good deeds and praise your Father in heaven.” Matthew 5:16

I never want to focus on good deeds because I know it’s easy to get in the mindset that good deeds is what brings you to Jesus, or makes you worthy of His love. Jesus’ love is unconditional, He saved us because He loves us. Period.

Anyway, we’ve done lots of light crafts (including a Christian t-shirt!) so after we had read the verse I was kinda bummed that I chose it because I couldn’t think of anything cool to do with the verse. You can only draw so many sunshines and use glitter so many times.

We finally settled on a sun catcher. And suddenly this seemed brilliant to me. Here we are in the middle of winter, a normally drab and dark time. Hanging a sun catcher up in the window wouldn’t BRING us any light–only make us appreciate it and add some color to our day. What a great picture of what our GOODNESS can do for others—we are NOT The Light nor do our good deeds actually make anything happen BUT they do make others aware of  The Light. Our good deeds bring attention and color to a normally dark and drab world of sin!

I’m pretty sure Lydia didn’t get the nuances of our sun catcher craft, but it has been especially significant to me. I want Lydia and Asa to see my good deeds (cooking, cleaning, loving my husband, being patient with them) and when they do that it would make them aware of Jesus and His Light—that it would lead them to praise and follow their Father in Heaven.

CRAFT

It honestly is not as pretty as the original version that I found online (as usual), so I’ll just leave you with a few pictures and links to sun catchers.

This is actually the one we made. All you need is tissue paper and a clear plastic top (which we didn’t have, so I used a disposable plastic container). We made ours in the shape of heart and a candle. You know, obvious reference to Matthew 5:16. Oh, and we used lime green tissue paper, of course. (see complete instructions at Making Friends.)

I love this one with the pressed flowers. I guess it would be kind of hard to do in the middle of winter, but even some pinestraw and a few dried leaves might be pretty! Plus, you could do any shape as the frame! (Complete instructions at Great Ideas For Mom.)

This suncatcher from Family Fun is really the one I wanted to make. Isn’t it lovely? We just didn’t have any translucent beads in the house. Copper wire we had, but beads? Nope.

And how could we forget about my icy sun catcher? Always a crowd pleaser!

Wouldn’t it be fun to make all of these and line your winter-y windows with them?!

lime photo by darwin bell

Lately Lydia and I have been cooking while Asa takes his first nap. I am not a cook by nature. My dad and brother are the chefs in the family. They love food and understand how it works together. I just follow recipes. I was recently introduced to once a month cooking (also called batch cooking) and since then I have started cooking dinner during breakfast or lunch, making hundreds of pancakes at a time or cooking 12 chicken breasts at once just so I can freeze them and have easy meals for the rest of the week!

So the last few days Lydia and I have made a shepherd’s pie, crustless mini-quiche and meatballs. As we’ve spent this time together I’ve learned a few things…

1. Matching aprons are best. Lydia and I have several different aprons but Lydia’s favorite are the matching “Mommy and Me” aprons. I love that Lydia wants to match me. It’s such a reminder to be worthy of imitation.

2. Cooking teaches obedience. Lydia wonders if she can stir a certain way, pour as much as she wants or handle a knife. She’s learning to obey the recipe, trust my knowledge and be meticulous in following the rules. This is a double lesson because the results are always good!

3. I’m turning my daughter into a homemaker. Making quiche and browning ground beef doesn’t seem too exciting. But I’m planting small seeds of being a home manager, a caregiver and a woman who loves her family. Yesterday we were at a bakery and she said, “Mommy, you could learn to make bread. Then you could teach me and I wouldn’t have to come here [the bakery] to buy bread when I’m big!”.

4. Cooking teaches confidence. Lydia may only be breaking eggs or stirring something that doesn’t even need to be stirred, but when we pull a delicious meal out of the oven, Lydia believes she made it by herself! When we eat that meal and her Daddy and I rave about it, she glows! I could just cook by myself and tell her she’s too young to help. But instead, I’m giving her confidence and showing her that she can do anything!

I want to be purposeful in every area of my parenting. Cooking with Lydia has brought another dimension. It’s helped me realize that everything I do with her makes a lasting impression. I’m determined to lead my daughter on a path that will honor God—be it with a craft, a story or a crustless mini quiche.

Respectfully submitted to the fabulous Finer Thing Friday by Amy.

We’ve been praying with Juliet ever since she was a tiny baby. Every night before she goes to bed, all three of us get together and have a family prayer time. And although, we have made a habit out of this, the actual process we go through has evolved over the years.

When she was an infant, Ben would hold her in his arms and we would stand together and pray with her before placing her in her crib at night. Our prayers would always be about her and about how grateful we were to God for sending her into our lives.

As she began to understand and speak herself, we added praying for others to our prayer time–for our family members, friends, and Compassion children.

To help her get involved in the praying, I decided to borrow an idea from Ben’s family and also from some missionary friends of ours.

Ben grew up with the tradition of placing all the Christmas cards his family received into a basket and then choosing one card at every mealtime. The family would then pray specifically for the family on the Christmas card. Our missionary friends do something similar. They have family photos of all of their supporters and then choose one a day to pray for. My friend Kristi tells me that her kids really connect to the photos and are able to pray more specifically when they can see who they are praying for.

I wanted to make our prayer time more concrete for Juliet and also give her a way to feel like she was part of the process, so I searched for a box that would be our “prayer box.”

It’s an old cigar box that I had picked up awhile back and didn’t know what to do with it. It said “Julieta”, so I couldn’t resist! I thought it was beautiful and it is the perfect size for holding pictures.

Inside, you can see we keep photos of our family members, friends, and Compassion children. Every night, Juliet reaches in selects who we are praying for and then holds it in her hands as we pray. She LOVES it!

We have a lot of Christmas cards in the box and also a few birth announcements. For our family members, I tried to print out pictures of them with Juliet in the picture as well. This always makes her smile when she sees herself with Mimi or Poppy or one of her cousins.

Lately, our process has changed again. Instead of drawing a picture from the prayer box, we simply ask Juliet who we should pray for tonight. Each night, she comes up with someone new! She has grown out of the prayer box–as she no longer needs a visual cue to help her decide who to pray for. And she has even begun to chime in and add her own thoughts to our prayers!

And even though I am kind of sad to see it fall into disuse, I am happy to see my daughter growing and able to take an active role in our nightly prayer time. And I’m sure I’ll be able to find another use for that beautiful box.

What about you? How do you get your children to pray with you? Do you have any family routines or traditions?

Remember the Fruit of the Spirit series Lydia and I did? Well, you may have forgotten it because Christmas kinda took over and now I’m just turning back to it. Don’t hold it against me, ok?!

With all the discipline and behavior issues we’ve had lately, this Fruit of the Spirit really stuck out to me this week: GENTLENESS. I need it. She needs it. Our household needs it.

SCRIPTURE

The first verse that comes to mind (and was our “A” verse) is Proverbs 15: 1, “A gentle answer turns anger away.” Today would have been a perfect time for Lydia to test this verse out as I was pretty angry with her behavior most of the day. Alas, it’s me who had to practice this verse so I could set the gentle example. (Not sure if I did it…)

As I looked through the verses about gentleness, it was encouraging because most of them were referring to Jesus. Or encouraging us to be gentle like Him. Isn’t it lovely to think about Jesus as gentle? Sometimes its easy to fall into that Zeus-like god image where Jesus/God is sitting there impatient, disappointed and ready to knock our heads together. I love thinking about Jesus as the gentle Good Shepherd instead. What a model to emulate!

The verse I ended up choosing is found in 1 Peter 3:3-4. It is the perfect verse for my girly girl:

Braiding your hair doesn’t make you beautiful. Wearing gold jewelry or fine clothes doesn’t make you beautiful. Instead, your beauty comes from inside you. It is the beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit. Beauty like that doesn’t fade away. God places great value on it.

Lydia was amazed that braids are in the Bible. And gold jewelry! She had it 90% memorized after reading it three times. I kid you not. Every time she learns a new verse I feel bad for not teaching her more—she’s a sponge!

ACTIVITY

I chose grapes to represent gentleness. Basically because a lime and grapes is all that’s left from our scratch-n-sniff fruit basket. So, we made the coolest grape craft after dinner tonight. I found it at Danielle’s Place (a great site–especially if you teach kids at church!)

All you need is a funnel, flour, one balloon and a little scrap of green craft foam. Use the funnel to fill the balloon. Then tie. Add a little leaf to the top (cut or punch a hole and pull the knot through). Now you’ve got your own fruity stressball! Isn’t it cute?

We talked about how soft and nice it was to squeeze her new “Gentle Grape”. She loves it and decided she is going to carry it “EVERYWHERE WE GO TOMORROW!” I hope she carries some gentleness, too. My heart AND hers are in need of some gentleness.

photo by lanier67

Part 1 of our behavior chart adventure was actually a great success! Lydia was well-behaved. She received more positive than negative marks on her chart. The only problem is that I was out of town so she was with my parents for two days. Then on the day she was supposed to go out for her reward it was raining and my husband was alone with the kids. He didn’t have the pluck to take both kids out by himself in the rain. (I can’t say I blame him, either.)

So, on my first day home, Lydia was…a nightmare. I called my husband and said, “I wish you had taken Lydia on her reward because she has been SO bad today there is no way we can give it to her.” This has continued all week. She’s had her favorite stuffed animal taken from her. She’s had spankings. She’s been in time out too many times to count. And she just holds on to that rebelliousness ALL DAY LONG.

At about 10:00 this morning I had enough. I sent her to a silent time out in the other room. And I did what all good crazed parents do: I turned to twitter.

Soon I had over 10 responses. (Some of them VERY good, too!)

But this one hit me like a ton of bricks.

(from Sandra at Celebrate Every Day)

I literally smacked my hand to my forehead. It’s obvious my daughter is sinning. The only way to combat sin in our lives is through God’s Word. WHY DIDN’T I THINK OF THAT BEFORE?!

So, we made another chart (I didn’t even take a picture of it because it’s so ugly. Really.) The top said, “Philippians 2:14: “Do everything without COMPLAINING or ARGUING.”

Then I made two columns on the bottom: one entitled LYDIA and the other entitled MOMMY. I told Lydia that every time she obeys the verse she gets a sticker. And even if I get onto her and she stops and obeys, she’ll get a sticker. But if she doesn’t then I get to make a mark in my section (an X, a line or a sad face).

She LOVED this idea. She was determined to get more stickers than me.

And the rest of the day was a DREAM.

We repeated the verse a lot of times. And each time she did it happily. She said, “OK, Mommy!” every time I asked her to do something. Twice she was reprimanded for something and I could see the internal struggle to pout. Instead she mustered up her self-control and said, “OK, Mommy.” Once we had to say the verse together in the middle of her “internal struggle”. But she said it with a lightness and sweetness in her voice.

I was amazed.

Before we went to bed we reviewed the chart. We talked about how great of a day this was without the whining and trouble. I told her we were only going to do the chart one more day.

Lydia: Why?

Me: Well, why do we obey the Bible? Why do we obey this verse? For stickers?

Lydia: (laughing) Nooo!

Me: We obey because God wants our hearts to obey and love him. This chart and these stickers are just practice so you can really learn how to obey.

Lydia: I’m going to get even MORE stickers tomorrow!

Tonight when we prayed before bedtime I had such a clear picture of WHY God gave us His Word. It isn’t just so we can honor Him. It’s also so OUR lives will be better. When Lydia obeyed, it changed the whole atmosphere of our house. What a picture to me as an adult, a wife and a mother—when I obey God, think of others first and control my mouth the atmosphere around me changes. I will see good things in my life because I’m obeying God!

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photo by pewari

It has taken me a whole month to even begin my New Year’s goal of waking up before my kids. Asa regularly wakes up at…wait, he doesn’t REGULARLY wake up. Some days its 5:30, sometimes 6:00 and when we’re really lucky it’s 6:30. Nonetheless, I was feeling grumpy regardless of when he woke, I was taking showers at 5:45pm and not getting my day started until naptimes!

So, I bit the bullet and decided I had to wake up early. I wasn’t so deluded to think that I’d shower, exercise and make breakfast before the kids woke up. Oh no, I just decided I had to get up early enough to do ONE of those things. I didn’t care which one.

I’m going to be completely honest and say that this is only the 2nd day I’ve woken up early. I was staring at my clock at 5:59 this morning. Begging it to stay there. Finally at 6:02 I crawled out of bed, grabbed a blanket, my Bible and a notebook and sat at the kitchen table.

I wrote a little, read a little and then decided I’d make a list of people and situations to pray for. Then I remembered! I have a calendar of prayer points—to pray for your children. And who else do I want (NEED) to pray for than my kids? You’d think as a mom, you’d pray for your kids all the time, right? Sure, I pray for them. But mostly it’s, “please let him stop crying.” OR “please help me figure out how to help her obey” and “God is great, God is good…”.

Today’s prayer was labeled: SALVATION.

*sigh*

Isn’t that my goal? Isn’t that the reason I stay home? Teach my kids Bible stories? Do crafts? Play games? Sing songs? I do these things to show them Jesus so they will look for and receive SALVATION from Him! And I thought this getting up early thing was going to be so I could get a shower in! The prayer was a simple one based on Isaiah 45:8 and 2 Timothy 2:10…

Lord, let salvation spring up within my children that they may obtain the salvation that is in Christ Jesus, with eternal glory.

So. Now my goal in the morning is not to get a shower, to make breakfast or to do yoga. It’s to pray for my kids. It’s to read that little prayer, get it into my heart and mind so I can focus on it the rest of the day. So I can do my “job” of being a mother with the leadership of Jesus.

And for the record? This morning I read my Bible, exercised, took a shower AND made breakfast before the kids got up!

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More amazing and totally worth your time resources to help you pray for your children:

Prayer Calendar from Mom and Loving It {scroll down, it’s a pdf on the bottom of the page}

The Power of a Praying Parent by Stormie Omartian {her blog is filled with resources, too!}

Inspired to Action blog and free ebook, Maximize Your Mornings {you MUST click and look around. such good stuff.}

Seven Prayers a Day at Bring the Rain

Lifting Hands {a prayer-a-day blog. it’s not updated daily this year, but you can use the previous years!}

Praying for Our Children by The Other Mama