[from the archives] I came into the living room early in the morning to hang Josiah’s Birthday Banner. I made one for each of the kids when they were young. Each year on their birthday I put a “patch” on it that represents something significant about them or their interests for the previous year. The… Continue reading Birthday
Author: BarbiePoling
Lifestyle of Learning Kids Are Creative
The “Dance” Ends
[from the archives] In my previous post I described a habitual relational interchange that was relatively frequent between my youngest two children. Josiah would like to tell Lizzy how something should be done, Lizzy would ignore him, Josiah would become frustrated and finally try to grab what ever it was, Lizzy would deflect and body… Continue reading The “Dance” Ends
Christlike Character and Chores
[from the archives] Rachel came into my room and flopped onto my bed. “Hi Mommy!” she said in her happy-to-see-me high voice. She rolled over to face me with her chin in her hands and asked me what I was doin’. “I’m trying to sort through these Lifestyle of Learning articles. I want to categorize… Continue reading Christlike Character and Chores
Provoking and Offense
[from the archives] “You can blog about how I ate FIVE strips of steak, Mommy!” Lizzy recommended enthusiastically as she finished off her fifth piece. We all burst out in laughter, and so did Lizzy. That’s very common at our house—laughter. So there you have it. I’ve blogged about Lizzy’s five strips of steak! The… Continue reading Provoking and Offense
Unloving Control Ends
In my previous blog I talked about the unloving way my son Phillip used to handle kitchen clean-up. He saw that his younger siblings were not doing what they were supposed to do, but he responded by trying to control them with harshness, like so many parents try to do with their own children. At… Continue reading Unloving Control Ends
Getting More Specific
[from the archives] In my last blog post, I was talking about training my children to clean the kitchen in love together as a team. As I think more about my kids’ process of learning, I remember more about how it used to be as I dealt with their hearts in this area. Phillip was… Continue reading Getting More Specific
Cleaning the Kitchen in Love
[from the archives] Up until three or so years ago, I had all my kids cleaning the kitchen together after meals. I used to have all the kitchen cleaning tasks written out on 3×5 cards. I had neon yellow cards for the easy tasks like taking out the trash, wiping the table, clearing the table,… Continue reading Cleaning the Kitchen in Love
Predictable Response
[from the archives] Lizzy popped her head into my bedroom door and with a slight offended frown on her face she said, “There’s a dinner pot in the sink.” That might not make sense to you, but it made perfect sense to me because I know my children well, and I can read beneath the… Continue reading Predictable Response
Something Bigger Than Ourselves
[from the archives] As I pondered my parenting today, I thought, “There isn’t much to write about.” I had been in my room working nearly all day on ministry web-sites, blog set-up, phone calls and facebook messages, only stopping long enough to make suggestions to Annie about how to iron an old dress-up dress and… Continue reading Something Bigger Than Ourselves