Continue reading]]> Well this is the last week in month 4 of my parenting plan. I’ve been working on listening to my kids more and the results have been absolutely incredible. There have been a couple times I failed and I had to apologize and ask my kids to repeat themselves because I was tuning them out.  That’s not an excuse for me to tune them out, it’s just breaking a bad habit takes some time to master.  Overall, though I have been very pleased with the results and even after only a few months time, my kids seem happier and more secure.  And I’m happier and more secure as a Mom.

I know I’ve mentioned this before, but it’s really amazing to me how clearly I can see results each week and how I just have a desire to change and be better and it’s pretty easy for me to follow through with.  It must be by some pretty powerful fairy magic that good changes happen in our family.  Thanks good fairy!

Look closely, you might see the good fairy in the background :).

Continue reading]]> I hope everyone had a lovely Thanksgiving.  Ours was perfect filled with friends, family and great food and lots of ping pong :).

This year I have been taking baby steps and working toward being a better Mom.  I have noticed an overall sense of peace, contentment and love in our home since I have been doing small things each month to improve as a Mom.  This month I am working on really listening to my kids.  Whereas before, I just would have said “uh huh” to everything my kids were saying instead of really hearing them out, this month I’ve been trying really hard to listen well and discuss things with them.

I have been worried about my busy life and the busyness interfering with my goal this month (with the holidays coming up and all).  But really it hasn’t.  I have been a lot less stressed out than I usually am this time of year and the last couple days, although they were filled with things to do, really didn’t feel stressful to me.

I’ve found this goal to occur naturally as I have tried to be better.  I still have moments where I have to seek out a child and ask them to repeat what they said because I didn’t hear them (really meaning I wasn’t listening and was distracted by something else).  But I feel a closeness to them when I really intently listen and try to understand what they’re going through.  I hope this parenting plan helps someone out there!

Continue reading]]> I woke up this morning in a funk.  I was disappointed about the results of last night’s presidential election.  I really wanted Mitt Romney to win and when he didn’t, I got in a mood.  You don’t want to mess with me when I get in a mood!

As I woke up this morning and knelt down to say my morning prayers, I had a sense of peace wash over me.  I realized that I was getting angry about something I had absolutely no control over.  There was no way I could change the election results. I can’t change our country.  I can’t make people get jobs.  The only thing I can change is me.  When I let my thoughts wander about what things I would like to change about myself, I immediately felt a sense of deep understanding that who I am is ok with God and he’s pretty darn happy that I’m trying to be better.  This means a lot to me and I will tell you why.

When I was a young woman, I daydreamed about what kind of Mom I would be someday.  I didn’t grow up in a traditional home, so I just kind of made up in my mind the kind of life I believed I would have somewhere out there in the future.  It would start off with a marriage to a man who shared equally in all responsibilities around the house including cooking, cleaning, finances, and child-rearing.  We would have a perfect and happy marriage with stellar communication. Next would come the kids, lots of kids.  I was an only child and always wanted brothers and sisters.  When the kids came, I would quit my job and be a stay at home Mom, and I would enjoy every minute.  Being a stay at home Mom would insure that my house would be clean, my meals would be healthy, and my kids would have perfect hair and clothes.  In my daydream of my future life, my kids would get along smashingly, my husband would appreciate all of my stellar efforts, and everyone would be one big happy family.

Well, fast forward to reality.  Here I am frazzled, juggling work that’s not really working, keeping the children alive, stacking up dishes in the sink so they don’t explode, cooking something remotely edible, volunteering in my not so spare time, church service, yard work, home work, budgeting, couponing, exercising, sewing, breaking up arguments between feuding children, errands, sports and music practice, and driving…. lots and lots of driving.  What happened to my little girl dreams of the perfect life?  And why am I still judging myself on those same impossible standards?

My life is never going to be perfect.  That’s a fact.  Concrete.  It will not change.  While I face many challenges and I’m literally frazzled and on edge 90% of the time (the other 10% I’m sleeping), I can improve, but I need to give myself credit for trying, even when I fail. I have learned the most from the times I have failed big time in my life.  While my life isn’t perfect, it’s pretty darn great and I really need to focus on the good things more than the bad.  I have been happily married for 13 years, which is longer than I’ve ever done anything before.  I have 3 wonderful kids that won’t die if they eat chili from a can and haven’t brushed their hair in 2 days.  I have great friends and family, a great house, transportation, and lots of opportunities ahead of me.  I want to be confident in my blessings instead of having an inferiority complex hangover.

I’ve done this parenting plan thing for 3 months now and I’ve seen huge changes in myself as a mother and huge changes in my kids.  I haven’t been perfect at it. I am trying though.  I am thinking that this month I will work on really listening to my kids.  Do you know what I mean?  Here’s me:  “uh huh,” “yeah,”, “I don’t know”.  I have no clue what my kid just said because I totally tuned them out, but I agreed with it….  I don’t like doing this and I want to be better.  I want to have conversations with my kids without worrying about the 10 loads of laundry blocking the entrance to my bedroom, or the millions of things that should probably get done in the next 5 minutes.  What’s more important, that stuff, or the kids? I want to be able to tune out that noise in my head that blares about the chores and tasks I should be doing, when my heart tells me I should be engaging with my kids more.

I will post about my experiences this month.  I’d also love to hear from you.  What things are you trying to change and improve at?

Continue reading]]> A friend of mine posted this article on facebook last week and it was something I wanted to try in my parenting plan series (well, the hugging part of it anyway).  I’m all about the baby steps.  It’s hard to take on monuments projects all at once, so I’m trying to be a better Mom one step at a time.  This month I will work on giving my kids more hugs.  I give my youngest lots of hugs every day, but I’ve noticed the older my kids get, the more they kind of shy away from getting hugs.  My 8 year old still likes them, but my 11 year old doesn’t really want anything to do with physical contact with me.

I decided this week, I would just observe a little about my kids patterns and decide what would be the best way to go forward.  I think physical affection can seem artificial if it is not done in the right way (or if it is forced or too much at once), so I just want to make sure I do a good job.  I started being aware that I wasn’t giving my 11 year old enough hugs and so I just started giving her 1 or 2 more per day than I usually do.  Already, she has come to me and given me hugs on her own, which she hasn’t done in years.  I was so happy that this change was taking place and that my friend posted this and brought it to my attention.

This week I plan to be more conscious of giving all my kids more hugs.  It will be good for everyone involved I think!

Disclaimer: **All parenting advice and information on Positively Mommy is provided for informational purposes only. Unless otherwise noted, the site content is not written by doctors, psychologists, or other health care professionals. The staff at Positively Mommy do not have psychiatric degrees or any other therapeutic training. The majority of our advice is drawn from personal experience and thus represents personal opinion. It is not a substitute for professional medical or psychological advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Any reliance on the information Positively Mommy provides is solely at the risk of the user. Positively Mommy does not assume any responsibility for damage or injury to persons or property that may arise from the use of the advice and information Positively Mommy provides.