Little Moments

The other day, after Emily and Gracey were playing at our neighbor's house, Emily came home in tears. I could only hear little phrases here and there, but it was the usual "neighbor-kid is so mean" story. We have quite a few kids in our neighborhood, most of them being older than Emily by a couple of years. Not only are they older, but one of the boy's is a little rough. When I look out the window and see all the kids jumping on the trampoline, I can usually bet that one of them will be crying soon. I don't usually see kids being mean on purpose but, like most kids, they argue and feelings get hurt every now and then.

I usually just let them go at it and then try and pick up the pieces after the catastrophe. This day, however, Corky was home from work a little earlier than normal and was the one to talk Emily through it. I watched from the kitchen this tender moment between a dad and daughter. Even though Emily was sad and crying I could have watched it all day.




Corky is such a good dad to our girls. He is patient, kind, and doesn't disregard their thoughts and feelings just because they are kids. I have a lot of mental pictures of other moments like this, but I am so glad that I got some real pictures through my window.

Green Eggs and Ham

In honor of Dr. Suess's birthday (March 2) I made some green eggs and ham for the girls. Not surprisingly, Gracey thought it was completely awesome. Again, not surprisingly in the least, Emily thought it was the most disgusting thing she has ever seen. In fact, her exact words after turning her nose up at it was, "I am NOT eating this, it looks disgusting."

After promising that it tastes the exact same as regular eggs, she tried it and, go figure, she liked it!

Doing service in her own little way.

This last week Corky and I were so impressed with our Gracey-girl. You see, her favorite thing in the world is to accomplish something. Anything. When a challenge is presented to her, especially when followed by a prize, she puts her blinders on and moves forward until her goal is accomplished. Of course, we are talking about a 6year child's goals, but they are her's. Her kindergarten teacher presented a challenge to the class that if they ALL could count to 100 by 5's, then she would walk them to Braum's for some ice cream. Braum's is awesome. I have talked about it briefly here.

So Gracey has this challenge in her head to count by 5's and pretty much accomplished it within a day. As the week goes on, I asked her at dinner one night how her class was doing with their goal. She said a lot of them can do it but there is one boy that is having a hard time remembering. Then she said,

"but I have been practicing with him at recess to help him learn!"

Corky and I made a huge deal to her about how kind that was and how proud we were of her for helping him. It's true too, we are very proud. Even though her ultimate goal is that she will get to enjoy an ice cream party, I know that she is on the right track to experiencing the joy of serving others. As she grows, she will learn that the ultimate prize for helping others is simply the love and satisfaction of doing good.

Beiber Fever

It is happening. My kids are jumping on the bandwagon and totally digging the Biebster! I think it started last summer when we were visiting St. George, I took them to a Zumbatonic class (Zumba for kids) and they danced to "Baby, Baby, Baby, Oooooh!"

Last month I worked at Gracey's school's book fair for a few hours with my kids in tote. I told them that if they played patiently, I would let them pick out their own book that was $5 or less. Gracey could not decide between a Justin Bieber book or the Justin Bieber poster. I realize a poster IS NOT a book, but after how well they behaved for me, I didn't even care. Like I said, this was a real struggle for her as she saw more and more people purchasing the poster. I mentioned to her that I would buy the poster for her if she wanted to use her own money for the book. She jumped on the idea and walked out of there a very happy girl.

Now to my favorite part of the story....

She was very proud of her poster and could not wait to show Corky. I don't remember seeing the reaction that Corky had, so I must not have been there. I do remember I had to be to the weekly youth activity for church that night so Corky put the girls to bed. When I came home, went into the girl's room to give them goodnight kisses, I laughed when I saw this!



Corky is such a good sport and helped her hang her beloved poster right above her bed!

Now, as Gracey crawls into bed every night, she says, "Goodnight Biebs!"

And if anyone is curious what book Emily picked out, Gracey encouraged her to pick out a book about Taylor Swift.