What is it about having small children that prompts strangers to offer unsolicited words of wisdom? No, kind lady at Target, I’m not sure I want to hear your birthing story—though I’m sure it’s got the entertainment value of an action film—I’d prefer my curious seven-year-old not have nightmares tonight. So I’ve been keeping my…
As a new school year is beginning here in Northeast Ohio, many kids and families will face a daunting challenge at church. Transitions are highly anticipated by most kids and families. At many churches, preschoolers entering kindergarten start to attend elementary school large group worship next Sunday. Kids entering sixth grade begin middle school programming…
Words That Build Not long ago, my husband and I were asked to share with a group of parents what we would do again in regards to raising our kids. We began asking ourselves if we had to go all the way back to the beginning (20 years ago) and start over, what would we choose…
Growing up, whenever I got in trouble, my punishment was being sent to my room. To an introverted kid, this was a delight. I just curled up with some good books and got lost in my imagination for a while. My oldest boy, Asher, shares this same affinity for quiet time. When sharing a room…
Conversations Happen Over Blueberries and Bathwater “My husband died when my children were in preschool. He was sick for twelve hours with an illness the ER doctors misdiagnosed, and he died on our bedroom floor two days before Christmas. Overnight, my children lost their dad and I became a 31-year-old widow.” These are the…
So you might have noticed there’s this tension in parenting. Okay . . . you may have noticed, there are 1,000 tensions in parenting, but today I’m going to focus on just one. What tension you ask? The tension between the parent who wants to enforce the rules and the parent who wants to focus on…
If you were asked to share with a group of parents things you’re glad you did as you were raising your kids, what would you say? My husband and I were given this opportunity recently at our church. Over the next five posts, I want to share with you the five choices we’re glad…
In a perfect world, I would be patiently doing many hours of therapy each day with my son and in a perfect world, he would be meeting milestone after milestone. Then there’s reality. Calvin is one of five kids who need me, he is not “catching up” developmentally, and some days it’s all I can do to…
What does it mean to have faith on this parenting journey? September will mark 16 years since autism came into our lives. J was 22 months old. In the very early days, faith meant trusting God for healing. People prayed and encouraged and gave us timelines for God’s miracle. “By 6 he will be healed!”…
Splink 1: Go and Find Play Sardines, a variation of Hide and Seek. Choose one person to hide while everyone else closes their eyes and counts to 25. When the counting is completed, each person searches for the hider. When someone finds the hider, he or she doesn’t say anything but quietly crawls into…