Letters of Love

As I ready my children for school, I stand at my kitchen counter packing wholesome lunches all set to be tucked away into their boxes and carted off to school. Along with their balanced meal, I lovingly slip in a note of love which promises of homemade cookies and cold milk upon their return. –– WAIT!… Scratch that… How could I forget? I don’t send my kids off to school. I don’t pack them lunches in cute little boxes. I don’t give them milk and cookies when they come back because they never leave. I don’t send them little love notes in their lunch pails; there are no lunch pails.

When shopping for back-to-school supplies, I happened upon a set of adorable lunch note cards for parents. What a cute idea, I thought! In reality, I have no use for them. We homeschool, so I don’t pack meals for our kids. I don’t box a lunch for my guy; he works at home. I make our lunch at the stove and then we sit down to eat as a family But the idea behind the love notes was touching. Surely there must be a way for me to use them. Then an idea struck! Part of dating someone is writing love letters, right? So if I was “dating my children“, surely I would need to write them “love letters”. These little notes would indeed come in handy.
Now I needed to find creative ways to deliver my letters of love. Perhaps when we are on a field trip, I could attach them to their juice boxes or water bottles. I could tuck it into the front cover of their current read. I could stick them to the chairs at the kitchen table between breakfast and the beginning of our day. There are so many possibilities, I could go on forever.

Whether it is a stack of silly little notes or a handmade card, I need to remember my family appreciates these demonstrations of love. To them, it is anything but little. I constantly am trying to find ways to show my heart and express my feelings. As homeschoolers, I have to be a tad more creative. I am learning to take advantage of an opportunity when I see it. I can’t use a lunchbox, but I can use other things. The key is remembering and doing, no matter how little or how silly.

“Train up a child in the way he should go; even when he is old he will not depart from it.”
~ Proverbs 22:6

We’d love to know… Do you write your children letters of love? What creative ways to do you find to deliver them?

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Working Out Their Own Faith

Our family recently had the opportunity to visit with friends at their daughter’s birthday party. The kids had a blast, and we were able to catch up on recent happenings. But instead of walking away feeling refreshed and encouraged, I found myself thoughtful and frustrated. During our short visit, the father had expressed to my husband how he hoped we had enjoyed the young years while they had lasted. His reasoning? He went on to explain that all children need to work out their own faith and go through their own gospel experience. Now that our children were teens, we would lose our children to the world and they would rebel.

While I believe his heart was in the right place – he meant to impart wisdom – his words rubbed me raw. Do all children need to accept God on their own? YES! While it might sound like a cliché; God does not have any grandchildren. We don’t piggyback on our parent’s faith. We need to have our own. What I do not believe is that all children need to go through a hard, rebellious stage before accepting Christ as Savior. While there are no foolproof ways to keep our children from rebelling, there are steps we can take which help them make the right choices. Not all children go through this stage.

So, how do we go about preventing rebellion? I honestly think it all boils down to relationship. When our children know we love them and our choices reflect this love, they are less likely to rebel. When our children love us in return, they will do everything in their power to please us and bring us joy.

The key to squashing rebellion is love. We ought to be loving on our kids constantly and allowing them to love on us. We have open communication with lots of talk about why decisions are made in our home. Love is not casual permissiveness. (We don’t just give them what they want.) Love sometimes means correction, discipline, and consequences. When we love on our kids to this extent, we know who their friends are and their friends’ families. We know who is offering influence and we curb those choices; explaining them to our kids and why.

I believe that when our children see the evidence of love in our relationship with God, in our marriages, and for them, they will naturally want to please us. This love also opens doors for how they view God. Through our conversations, our actions, and our affection, our children see faith in action. They will see the blessings that come with a life lived for Him. They will see the distinction between those who rebel and those who obey. Our children will naturally come to their faith and without necessarily having to experience a tragic testimony.

Does this mean our children are perfect? Heavens, no! We aren’t perfected yet so why would be expected this of them? What this does mean, is that they will not willfully go out and hurt themselves, us, or God. While they might make mistakes, they are not doing so out of mutinous emotion.

I can always tell when I am failing to love on my children as much as I ought. Our children question my authority, they act out, and they have a hard time controlling their own emotions. This is a wake up call for me. I have somehow dropped the ball and need to bring things back into perspective. Once I get things back into focus, our children naturally resume their loving nature. The problem is usually me!

If I learned one thing from that afternoon with our friends, it was this… Unless I want my children to contribute to this statistic, I need to be proactive. I have a choice. I can allow this to happen or I can strive to prevent it. The only way I can see that happening is through strong doses of love. Supernatural, unconditional love; which only comes from the Father. With His help will my children be victorious in working out their faith.

“Train up a child in the way he should go; even when he is old he will not depart from it.”
~ Proverbs 22:6

Your Turn!: Do you know a family whose children have yet to rebel? What do you think was the key to their success?

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I Just Want to Be Loved

People want to be loved, people need to be loved. I understand this concept, really I do. Hey, I want to be loved, too. Who doesn’t? But having children just so you can feel the love of another person is not a good idea.

My heart hurt when I heard this young lady tell me her desire to have children stemmed from a desire to have someone in this world who truly loved her. What must it be like to feel that alone and undesired?

I wish raising kids was all about love, but unfortunately it’s not. It would be so easy if all we had to do was love on them and they needed to love on us; life would be simple and sweet. However, that is not reality. Children do need love. They also need discipline, training, an education, and so much more.

If we are expecting our children to fill a void in our lives, we are putting an enormous amount of pressure on them and setting ourselves up for failure. No one human should be responsible for our feeling loved. No child should have that much hanging over them.

Does this mean we do not love our children? Of course not! However, having children out of love and having children to be loved are entirely different things. One should never confuse the two.

Being a parent is a huge job; one which should not be taken lightly. It is an incredible blessing which comes with enormous responsibility. Love is at the heart of all we do, but it is not the end of parenting.

Time to Chime In: What advice would you have given this young lady?

“Behold, children are a heritage from the Lord, the fruit of the womb a reward. Like arrows in the hand of a warrior are the children of one’s youth. Blessed is the man who fills his quiver with them! He shall not be put to shame when he speaks with his enemies in the gate.” – Psalm 127:3-5

I Love It!

Have you ever noticed that kids sometimes have a habit of using the words “like” and “love” interchangeably?

I want my children to very clearly distinguish between what is worthy of love and what is not. I also want them to be careful about throwing around the usage of “love”, like it is an interchangeable phrase with “like”.

 For instance, my kids received items for Christmas and upon opening them exclaimed, “I Love It!” While I appreciate the fact that my children really did enjoy the blessings put before them, it was a good occasion to remind them of  one very important fact….

We don’t “love” things, we “love” people!

It is okay to really like something, in fact we enjoy seeing them appreciate the blessings around them. However, loving things is not something we recommend.

Loving something means having a deep attachment or affection. Expressing “love” for something ought to be reserved for those things of greatest importance. “Love” should be about relationship, not about a tangible thing you can hold in your hand.

If we continue to use the word “love” for everyday use (I “love” pizza; I “love” my car), then when does the word “love” have real significance?

I believe that we should reserve the word “love” for those who have meaning in our lives. It shows them how truly important they are to us and the attachment we feel towards our relationship.

I “love” my God, my family and my friends. I “like” pizza, ice cream, and chocolate. (Okay, maybe I “really like” chocolate.)

How do you feel about the word “love”?

No Kiss Me, No Kiss Me!

My oldest girl when she was just a few months old.

When I was a very little girl, it seems I had an extremely close relationship with my father. He would snatch me up, tickle me with his mustache, and try to give me kisses. In response, I would giggle endlessly and scream out, “No kiss me, no kiss me!” Little did I know that my father would walk out of my life when I was only four years old, never to kiss me again.

Growing up, my mother did her best to be affectionate with my brother and I. We held hands while walking, we hugged, and we would occasionally sleep all together in one bed. As we got older though, the affection seemed less and further between on all our parts. Life became busy and we focused on other things.

Through junior high and high school, I began to look for an outlet; a place where my desire for affection would be gratified. While I can say that I remained pure during all of my schooling, that doesn’t mean I was completely innocent.

I liked being around guys who were willing to pay attention to me. I looked for excuses to give hugs and be close to someone. I wanted to know that I truly mattered to someone, that I was worthy of their time and effort.

My son when he was about a year old.

Jump to now… I am still a very affectionate person (much to my husband’s delight). I love to be held, hugged, and touched. I have found a guy who loves to show me how much he cares and in turns loves for me to show him.

Now, how does this at all relate to my kids? Simply this… I have known a great deal of women (and men) who have lacked affection in their lives; either from their parents or their spouses! The interesting factor is that generally the lack of affection stems from one place; CHILDHOOD!

It caused my husband and I to think. Would our children go looking for affection, if our home was filled with it? Would they feel the need to date at such a young age, if they were constantly being hugged and kissed?

While my mother was very affectionate with us as children, we were not as affectionate as teenagers (which is not entirely my mother’s fault; we probably didn’t initiate either). Why is it we often forget that teenagers need hugs too? Why do we allow them to pull away from us, instead of pursuing our children’s hearts?

I want to be purposeful about gaining the affection of my children. So, while they are young, I snatch them up and cuddle them. I find ways to tickle them, kiss them, rub their arms, pat their heads, gently tug their braids, sit cheek to cheek, and other lovely things of that nature.

When my children get older, there may be boundaries that they decide to set in place (“No kissing me in front of my friends, mom!”), but that will not prevent me from purposefully seeking them out. Whether they deny it or not, I think they will love being held and hugged. I think they will enjoy being cuddled, tickled, and kissed.

I pray that my children would not just know that we love them, but feel our love. I pray that my children would not feel the desire (as I did) for outside affection, but that they would gain all they need from our home.

Yes, one day my children will desire a Godly husband or wife (and they should!), but prayerfully it will be because that is the direction the Lord is leading them. It won’t be for lack of love and affection. It won’t be because their lives were missing something. It won’t be the need for attention. It will be for all the right reasons; a desire to share their lives with someone else and create a family of their own. 

It occurs to me, as I type, that my brother and I are now grown and gone from my mother’s house. I wonder if she ever feels lonely or lacks affection, living by herself. I need to be more purposeful in my love for my mother; hugging and kissing more often.

Perhaps this will teach my children to remain affectionate no matter their age. So that when they are grown and gone, they will still remember to come back and hug their dear, old mom and pop. Perhaps they will one day repeat my words, but with a different meaning, “No; kiss me. No; kiss me.”

Are you purposeful in your affections towards your children? How so?

Tying Strings

The relationships we have with our children will not always run smoothly. There will be times they need training and discipline. There will be times we provoke them or hurt them, even if it is unintentional. While it would be easy to say, “that’s part of life, they’ll get over it”, and move right along; it is crucially important we don’t.

There is a strong tie between a child and their parent; a bond that is more than just blood. When our relationships are injured and strained, we need to draw them back in and retie those strings.

How do we retie those strings once they have been pulled or cut? Here are some great suggestions that have been given to our family:

• Smile often and express joy in your child.
• Go out on a date and have a good time!
• Enjoy their company. Pick a book, a movie, or something they like and enjoy it together.
• Have a tickle war!
• Go on an adventure; even a hike can be adventurous.
• Make something together; it can be as simple as dinner or as complex as a treehouse.
• Include them in your daily responsibilities. When children have an opportunity to help out, they feel loved, respected, and needed.
• Hug often! Even big kids secretly like to be hugged; just grab them and let them know you are there.
• Tell them you love them; sometimes we take this for granted, but kids need to hear the words.
• Surprise them with “blessings”. Even something silly, like their favorite gum, can touch their hearts.

I am sure the list could go on and on, but it is definitely a starting point. As our children get older and as their personalities change, we will have to adapt the ideas; constantly growing along with our kids. 

More often than I would like, I find myself in a position of needing to discipline my kids. While this is important and needs to be done, I also need to make sure that I retie those strings of our relationship; reaffirming my love and affection.

If I fail to retie those bonds, my children will find me to be a tyrant or a bully. They will turn away from me, refusing to hear my words and rebelling against our authority. If I fail to retie the strings of our relationship, my children will cut themselves loose and I would lose their hearts.

The relationship I have with my children is crucially important. I need to be constantly aware of the “ties that bind” and ensure that they are strong.

How do you “tie strings”?