How to Raise Kids That are Truly Grateful

Ruth Schwenk

“Can we get froyo tonight?” my kids begged. “Pleeeease!!!”

Frozen yogurt, or froyo for short, is their current favorite dessert. In utter disbelief, I listened to my four children begging for more froyo just minutes after we had taken them to a particular restaurant for dinner. With a stern “No,” I launched into what I thought was a rather convincing lecture on gratefulness! Seriously! 

There are some days that as my children ask for more and more and more, I wonder if they will ever be satisfied. And I wonder where did all this want, want, and more want, begin??

A Prayer for the Mom Overwhelmed By More

Wynter Pitts

“Mommy, when I grow up, can I be a mommy like you?”

I was simply overjoyed when those sweet little words came out of my daughter’s precious mouth.  When raising young children, some days your strength relies on the encouragement of others. So imagine how I felt when I was receiving encouragement from the very subject of all my hard work.

All I could think was “Wow, I am doing it right! She wants to be like me!”

 

Moms, Are You Carrying More Than You Have To?

Christy Fitzwater

In central Wyoming, it wasn’t unusual for the weather to dip to 20 degrees below zero and stay there for a week or two in midwinter. Dad would call my name and tell me to follow him to the wood pile.

“Stick out your arms,” he would say.

Then he would pile me high with wood –more than I could have grabbed on my own but not so much that I couldn’t see over the top.

Carrying stuff. It’s something I understand now that I’ve been a mom.

When You Carry the Weight of a Child

misty krasawski

I remember the first time the weight of motherhood settled on me.

Growing up, there was one thing I was sure of: I was going to do everything differently than the way it had been done in my house. Must be part of the wiring of an intuitive, introverted, feeling, judging person, the watching and evaluating, the tossing aside of things that obviously don't work.

But I loved children, and I knew I wanted a houseful.  We welcomed the helpless, squirming newborn with open arms and happy eyes, and I drank in the wonder of him, the wonder of the chance to get it all right.

How to Love An Anxious Heart

Kristen Kill

Much has been said about how to deal with our own anxiety- we have to attend to it when we own it. We feel the tearing at our own hearts and our own minds, and we bear the scars. But what if the anxious heart in your care is not your own? What if your husband, child, sister or friend is the one who is struggling?

A Letter to our Children About Anxiety

A Letter to our Children About Anxiety

Summer Saldana

I still remember 8 years ago as though it was yesterday, the day that I woke up and no longer felt safe within my skin.

It was the day I began to experience a fear unlike anything I'd ever known. A fear caused by nothing, soothed by nothing, and seemed to be my lifelong uninvited unwelcomed constant companion.

It was the day I no longer felt like me, and the day I wondered if I'd ever get back to me again....

 

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