Heart to Heart with Diane

“Look-it, Mom!” The words sang through the ajar front door. Louisa had something exciting for me to see. Out of habit, I jumped up, though still in my nightgown, and ran out into the front yard to see a big Oriental Poppy just bursting forth from its pod, the brilliant orange tissue petals unfolding. That was worth seeing, as is every other “look it, Mom” that comes my way.

When I returned to the house, my oldest daughter Julianna questioned me, “Mom, why do you always jump right up and go see what the kids want to show you?” I thought back to the days when I started that habit. My, it has been nearly 30 years of “jumping up”!

One day, while bending over my little one’s latest enchantment, and seeing the thrill in his baby eyes, I thought about the future. I thought about how quickly those baby delights are set aside for little boy interests, and how suddenly little boys turn into big boys and big boys turn into men. I determined then and there that I didn’t want to miss a single one of those “Look-it, Mama” calls. Not a one. So I promised myself to get up, to jump up happily with a smile on my face, and see the world’s discoveries through the shining eyes of my child. And to consider it a privilege that my child wants to share his sweetest enjoyments with his beloved mama.

Nowadays, the “Look-it, Mama” calls come much less often, as my seven children are growing, growing . . . gone. Well, perhaps the grown children have turned to more mature requests for my attention, as they still want to talk to me about their discoveries and accomplishments. Thank goodness I still have Louisa calling “Look-it, Mom”—giving me the privilege of “jumping up” to share her delight and seeing the world anew through the eyes of a child.

Now, I don’t want to induce guilt. I’ve moaned many a time, “Honey, bring it to Mom to see!” (that never works, by the way) or “I’m too tired” (which becomes their parroted answer back to you when you make a request of them, unfortunately). I haven’t always jumped up. But, all in all, I think if a mom is available, it makes a huge difference in her child’s life.

I also don’t want you to feel that a mother must be at her child’s whimsical beck-and-call. But there is a magic in “jumping up”. For all that effort, I think those “jump-up’s” pay back a hundred-fold. I believe that choosing to get up cheerfully is an act of love. It firmly impresses upon our children’s minds that they are the most important work we could ever do, the most precious people in our lives. They can see that sharing their lives and experiences is our priority. Maybe that is why we become their best childhood friends. Maybe that is why they still want to share their joys and accomplishments with us, when they are grown.



“Pick up your shoes!”

“Clear the table!”

“You’ve left your coat on the couch.”

“Don’t leave a wet towel on your bedroom floor!”

Sound familiar? I sometimes feel like I am a repeating public announcement: “Keep your hands and feet inside the vehicle until it comes to a complete stop” . . . “No smoking in the terminal”.

I don’t want to be a nag, and I know kids can easily go “parent deaf” if much of our communication is just remind-remind-remind. I was thinking hard about this when it hit me—why should they listen?! Is there any benefit involved? Is there any good reason to tune in to a parent’s constant reminders? Or is it just mom going through the drill of repeating, reminding and nagging?

Having had this brilliant thought, it occurred to me to make it worth my daughter’s while to pick up the towel off her bedroom floor—or better yet, to motivate her not to ever throw it there in the first place. This was my biggest gripe and my constant nag, so—without any fanfare—I posted a note on the bathroom mirror: “$1 charge for a towel on the floor”.

Guess how many times she paid $1? Actually just once! Unfortunately, I had trained her to ignore me, to know that I would repeat it over a few more times before expecting action. So, she didn’t really believe that I meant what I posted. I saw the towel on her floor and playfully demanded payment with out-stretched hand: “Aha! I caught you! One dollar, please!”

Oh my, I was for real! Now there was a reason to listen. Now she was on guard! It became worth her while to regulate herself.

This didn’t make me feel very good. Oh, yes, I was thrilled to be able to stop reminding her, but I felt rather bad that I had allowed myself to become a negative background noise. The cure was just too easy. That was 3 months ago and it is still working. There have been no towels on her floor ever, even though the note is long gone. Why? Well, it finally became beneficial for her to change her behavior. I wish I could have realized that earlier, and saved my breath!

Next time you open your mouth to issue a command, to nag or remind, ask yourself, “why should they listen?” Once there is a reason that benefits them, they’ll hear quite well even if it is whispered just once, or posted without a word.

To your parenting success!

My grandbabies, Christian and Rachel Lily, learn some important life skills!

Homeschool and housework seem to be opposite words. They don’t seem very compatible.  But unless the one (housework) is done, the other (homeschool) is pretty hard to manage, for all the clutter and confusion.

I think that it dawns on every young mom pretty early on that this is not a great situation, and unless she figures out how to make housework a part of educating her children, she is either going to have to hire a servant, or be way overworked!

Thank goodness that housekeeping is a vital life skill that children really need to learn—since we have so much practice just waiting for them!  No need to create lessons, worksheets or experiments.  The cleaning and cooking is an ever present need.  Meals have to be cooked 3 x a day.  Dishes have to be washed. Bathrooms cleaned.  Clothes washed.

So, here’s how to get organized and educate  your children in the important skill of being a good housekeeper:

1) You clean your house and take good notes

As you clean a bathroom, for example,  jot down the steps.  In very simple terms.  Like this:

Small Bathroom

1. Clean mirror using window cleaner and a dry cloth.  Spray the mirror and wipe until all streaks are gone and the mirror is sparkling clean.
2. Use the window cleaner cloth to wipe the doorknob and the light switch plate.
3. Spray the sink with bathroom cleaner and wipe clean.
4. Wipe bathroom countertop.
5. Polish faucet and knobs with a dry cloth. . .

. . etc. (continued)

End with “Put away all your cleaning supplies, and hang your wet cloths in the laundry room to dry.”  This constitutes the daily clean of the room.

2. Make a child’s work chart

If you are training little ones, a picture chart is best.  For readers, highlight the keywords and make the directions clear and simple.  I put these directions into a plastic page protector and attach a wax pencil, wipe-off crayon or washable marker on a string.  This chart is attached inside a cabinet door (so it is hidden when the door is closed), or on the inside of the door to the room.

3. Train your first (and most willing) assistant

Now, for the training!  Start with the most eager child.  No sense getting discouraged at the onset of a new program.  Often children ages 4 to 9 are excited workers, wanting to imitate you anyway.  Older children may not be the place to start, unless they have a great attitude.  Better to get the willing children trained and let them train the older kids!

So, start with an eager child and show him how the job is to be done. Demonstrate. Take your little assistant into the room to be cleaned and open the cabinet door to reveal your cleaning chart.  Show him how he can mark off each task, and sign his initials on the bottom in a box.  Now do the job while he watches carefully: slowly demonstrate how its done.

4. Watch and “ooh and ahh”!

Now it is time for your protege to try doing the job under your praising, kind, gentle tutelage.  Watch him work. The focused attention alone does wonders. Interject little comments along the way:  “Wow, look at your scrubbing power!”, “Don’t forget to rub the faucet until you can see your smile”, “Your are an amazing worker!”, “I can’t wait to tell Daddy how big of a help you are to our family”, etc.

This is your chance to make sure every step is being followed accurately and thoroughly.  And that your child “gets it” when it comes to the task at hand. You are still training.

5. Easy does it!

Once you catch the vision of how wonderful housekeeping help could be, it is tempting to pile it on.  But, start easy—with just task #1 of the chart, and let your child show mastery before adding task #2.  Remember, this is more housekeeping help than you were getting before, so be patient and build up gradually. All the children need to learn these skills!  So, each child needs to be assigned a room and trained to complete the step-by-step tasks on the hidden chart from top to bottom. And then eventually rotated to another room, until they learn all the skills. That is the goal.  Older children can be trained to do more than one room at a time, perhaps alternating days.  I have some big tasks that are done just once a week, such as scrubbing the bathtub, or mopping floors, and these are listed on the bottom of the chart as “Saturday only” chores.

6. Check up

Charts in every room describing the tasks are a necessity. But even more important is your follow-up. If you do not “check charts” every morning after chore time, and inspect their work for accuracy (and as an opportunity to give them credit and praise), your whole system will soon fall apart.  They will work just as hard and just as carefully as you expect them to, and if you let a few days slide by without checking their work, you will find that they slide by and get lackadaisical.

7. Systemize other chores

So if you are assigning the laundry job to one of your children, the chart posted in the laundry room needs to list the task from start to finish . . . gather all dirty clothes hampers, sort into the 3 bins (white, medium, dark), etc.  Tasks such as laundry, cleaning their room, cooking a meal, washing the dog, cleaning out the fridge, etc. need step-by-step directions that any child can easily follow.  The edict “Go clean your room” feels like an impenetrable barricade.  Breaking the task into steps makes it doable.

In running a home, we could take a clue from a well-run business. Organization is essential!  Systems and procedures set in place make it so much easier for both the worker, and the supervisor.  The boss looks over your work and approves and praises you, or helps you learn how to do better. Everyone knows what is expected, and what standard to strive for.

Ah, some housekeeping help! Basic life skills learned by kids that really need to know them.  Young energy harnessed to the common good of the family. . . this feels right!

Have you ever gone on a mile hike on a new trail?  It seems long.  You don’t know the way, and not knowing where it will end, it seems to go on and on and on.  With each bend, you think you have surely reached the waterfall by now.  On the trail back, the hike seems more doable.  It always surprises me how fast the trek back goes. Knowing the end is in sight makes the path seem short.

I’ve learned something from my kids lately.  Something I think I knew, but forgot.  Setting a time limit on any work you are requiring from kids (or husband, for that matter) makes the task much more manageable.

I get up Saturday morning eager to do amazing things with our “working day”.  Irrational goals loom, as in:  clean the whole house, plant the whole garden, clean out the entire playroom and organize all the toys in bins, cook and freeze a month worth of meals, prune the whole orchard, sort out all our homeschool books, and other unreasonable objectives.  I have the zeal for the project, but not everyone in the family shares my enthusiasm, unfortunately.  When kids feel like you are going to work, work, work them, with no end in sight, it feels like a life sentence. My kids ask, “How long?”.  I want to say, “Til we’re done!”. But when I give them a time limit, it really does feel more manageable to them.  And they are happier workers.  And I appreciate their effort more.

Sure, I would like them to work all day long on my urgent project, but an hour of energetic effort is far better than nothing.  An hour from several kids and a husband can progress the job along amazingly far.  And having a time limit makes them more cooperative workers, seeing an end in sight.  There’s hope.  This is not an eternally unlimited work-a-thon.

Knowing that I won’t work her all day long, even my “I-hate-bugs-worms-and-dirt” daughter will cheerfully plant the lettuce seedlings into the garden (with a few screams here and there).

Set a time limit. It really helps!

Wow.  I am put off. I am disgruntled.  Am I living in the right century?

Today I wrote a few emails to get some information. (The names have been changed to protect the innocent . . . or the guilty, in this case!) The first email went a little like this:

Hi John,

Is your week going well? Say “hi” to Cary for me, please.

Is the meeting today at 10 AM at the church after all?

Thanks!

Diane

To which John replied:

yes

Hmmm, that isn’t feeling very warm and fuzzy.  I am going to trouble myself to go to your meeting—I’d like you at least say “thanks” to me.

Next email I wrote went something like this:

Hi Jessica,

The meeting went well.  I think your presentation was excellent!

I’ve thought about it, and I would like to volunteer to set up the display you were talking about.   I think it will take me about 6 hours initially and then an hour a week to maintain it.  I would need to get the information packet from you to get started.  If you and the other members of the committee like that idea, I’d be glad to get it going on it.

Have a great day!

Diane

To which she replied:

Okay by me.

What?! I just complimented you and then volunteered my precious time to set up your display and all you can say is: “okay by me”!!?

I am a Jane Austen fan— I admit it unabashedly.  I yearn for the niceties—for the formalities, if you will—that make life so much more pleasant. I delight in listening to the conversation when a love-tormented Mr. Darcy accidentally stumbles upon Elizabeth Bennett out walking.

“Is your mother well?” he asks.

“Quite well”, Elizabeth replies.

“And your father?” Mr Darcy continues.

“Yes, very well indeed”, Elizabeth returns.

Mr. Darcy longs to shout out the deep yearning feelings of his heart and his struggle with her rejection of him, but instead, he is a restrained gentlemen. He goes through the paces of pleasant exchange.  Somehow our texting, twittering, facebooking has reduced us to one line replies that show little concern or appreciation.

I just looked up “niceties” in the dictionary and it said, delicacy of character. Oh yes!  That is what I feel is lacking!

Yesterday, Louisa did something I thought was unfair and I asked her to apologize.

“Well, I’m not sorry”, she reasoned.

“Say it anyway”, I replied.

“S-aaaw-r-e-e-e” she exaggerated.

I felt better.  I really did. It didn’t really matter so much to me if she meant it or not. It still felt good to me to hear it.

Niceties. Formalities. Pleasantries. A more delicate society.

I miss it!

I have gone crazy over science videos!  Once I got a taste of these fabulous scientific movies, so excellently filmed with plenty of visual action and food for thought, I just can’t get enough!

I guess I got starved in public school science class all through my childhood, teen and even college years. The theory of evolution didn’t satisfy. It didn’t sync with the feelings of my soul.  It left me hungry.

Something in these wonderful science films really feeds my yearning to know.  Rather than being blatantly creation-oriented or preachy, they are neutral, just looking at the data and presenting the side we never hear about:  highly educated professors at top name universities saying, “the facts don’t jive, something’s wrong” when it comes to teaching evolution as a scientific law, rather than the theory that it is.  And there are other theories. Why don’t we ever get to ponder those? Why is just one theory taught in school, as if it were sacred?  Why does it get people so upset to suggest that it could be outdated and too simplistic?  It seems Darwin preempts our right to freedom of speech.

The more technology advances, the more scientific research is completed, the more unlikely Darwin’s theory really is. But it sure gets people mad to mention it!  I found it distressing to learn of professors all over the country, and in England and other European countries, who have been reprimanded, blacklisted, dismissed, shunned from publishing their findings in scientific journals who formerly welcomed them—all because new data casts an uncertain light on Darwin’s theory.  These are not Christians, these are simply scientists recording their findings. And those findings do not support the theory of evolution.

With microscopes that can probe the inner workings of the cell, new complexity has come to light.  The cell is not the jelly-filled blob that Darwin supposed it was. It is intricate order to the highest degree, and carries complex biological instructions for the work of the cell including repair and reproduction.  Not only is DNA complex beyond Darwin’s wildest imaginings, but the instructions coded into the cell are far above anything conceived of back in Darwin’s day.

This film is my favorite for an overview into the case for a Creator.  Lee Strobel of the Chicago Tribune, was a journalist supreme.  His occupation was to probe, dissect, interview, seek out data and express it for his readers.  Lee turned his focus onto the case for a creator. He wanted to find out what science had come up with, in all its seeking for the origin of life. What he found in his 20 year search surprised him.  And will strengthen your testimony that there is a Creator whose intelligence designed all things.

If you are just going to watch one science video, pick this one!  It gives a great overview of the field of science dealing with evidences that disprove Darwin’s theory.  The film is a visual treat, with lots of action.  My kids enjoyed watching it just as much as I did.  The  information is well-researched and intriguing.  Lee’s enthusiastic explanation of his findings is contagious.  He is wowed!  He is amazed!  It is hard to listen to him without wanting to jump for joy yourself!

Use this film for family night, for Sunday evening devotional, or  for science class in  your homeschool. Show it to your teens and older elementary kids. Lend it to your friends and neighbors. View it yourself with your husband so you have an understanding and conviction to model for your kids.  God’s works proclaim his signature—there is indeed a Creator, an intelligence that designed our world to the last detail.  Science itself attests to it.

See my other favorite science videos here.

The Case for a Creator

Product Description:

As a high school freshman, Lee Strobel became convinced that God did not exist. Only the hard, empirical evidence of science could be trusted–and it appeared to point to a universe created by purely materialistic processes. Time, chance, and Darwinian evolution.

This atheistic worldview deeply influenced Strobel’s academic years and early career as an award-winning journalist for the Chicago Tribune. Then, in 1980, his wife’s conversion to Christianity led him on an intensive search for the truth about God. Not surprisingly, he began with science.

What do the discoveries of modern biology, physics, cosmology, and astronomy really tell us about the origin of life and the universe? When objectively considered, does contemporary scientific evidence point toward or away from a supernatural Creator? Strobel interviewed scientists and scholars from a wide range of disciplines for the answers.

Based upon a New York Times best-seller, The Case for a Creator is a remarkable film about Lee Strobel’s journey from spiritual skepticism to a profound faith in the God who has etched His indelible signature upon every galaxy and living cell. The Creator now revealed by 21st century science.

One morning on my daily walk, I was fretting and stewing over what I could possibly do with my one-year-old during school time. I was feeling some despair with a new baby on its way. I couldn’t see any end to the disruption of babies in my home school for many years to come. I was praying and scheming at the same time: I could wait until the baby’s nap to teach school, I could rotate the children with baby-sitting chore away from our schoolroom, I could get a playpen . . . all solutions that didn’t feel right—babies needs their moms!

As I walked and pondered, suddenly the Lord introduced one sentence to my mind and revolutionized my mindset entirely! “The baby IS the lesson!” I thought I was trying to teach Math, but in reality I had been teaching, day by day, how an adult values the precious gift of children. My children, by watching how I deal with the frustration of a crying baby or keep a toddler happy and busy with some of his “own” pieces while we play a math game, are soaking up “the lesson”. Unfortunately, I had occasionally been teaching that the baby interrupts our learning.

How to be a Christlike person is the most valuable lesson a child could ever learn! The lesson is learned moment by moment; watching a parent being patient, handling frustration with kindness, pressing on for the goal in spite of numerous interruptions, valuing each child’s needs regardless of inconvenience. That valuable insight–how Mother handles the baby is the real lesson–has dramatically changed how I view my home school. I am teaching foremost my values: godly character, kindness, respect for others, individuality, sacrifice and a host of other Christlike attributes. Teaching them reading, writing, math, etc. is very important to me but my perspective has been altered. “Mimic me, follow me and I will show you the way a Christlike person acts and what he values”. That is the message every parent relays to their children whether they are aware of it or not. Children try to copy everything anyway (our mannerisms, our daily activities, etc.). We must be certain that we are providing a correct pattern for them to copy, not only in our daily activities but in our attitude, our tone of voice, and our facial expression. We need to conduct our lives so that we can say “follow me”. If our children are to “buy” our values, what a tremendous responsibility we have to make sure we are living our best so the lesson is clear and well learned! What more could you ask for from your homeschool than to produce Christlike people?!

Teaching your children basically means getting your own personal life in order and striving daily to be the leader for them to follow. Of course, we fall short and they must look to Christ for the perfect being but they need to see daily how one acts, speaks, lives, solves problems. We are acting as a proxy, in a sense, for Christ. Since they can’t have his daily role model, then he has given his children parents to be an example, to point the way. Along with lesson preparations, we need to prepare ourselves by asking: is the pattern I live the way Christ would act? Can I say today that I have marked the path for my children to follow? Children learn from seeing their parent’s role model. Watching an adult make a simple mistake (such as being too punitive with a child) and go through the process of repenting is 100 times more effective than your devotional lesson on repentance. This means children must be intimately involved with you in your daily life. A few hours a day after school won’t do it.

Children should be involved in the adult’s life rather than daily life rotating around the children. Research has shown that children who have grown up to be productive well-adjusted adults are those who have been drawn into the parent’s world; their daily activities, work, and interests; rather than having parents who centered their world on the child. When I began home schooling, I never could find the time to do the things I felt were important for my life; such as writing in my journal, corresponding with relatives, studying my scriptures, and more. Somehow, in my busy-ness of trying to teach the kids how to write in their journals, I was neglecting my own journal writing. Thankfully, we now have journal writing time in school daily, and we write letters to relatives together as a family on Sunday. Homeschool life should help parents do the daily necessities, rather than usurp the time needed for them. Home maintenance, chores, food preparation, gardening, food preservation, budgeting, clothing care (mending and sewing), planning family social relationships, caring for small children, record keeping, quilting, wallpapering, etc. are all wonderful life skills that can be done together that enhance a child’s education!

The parent’s joyful task is to lead and guide the child into the real world–not set up a contrived pseudo-world to teach skills that the children would easily learn if they spent their time around adults who were striving to live good lives. What constitutes an adult trying to live a “good life”? Being a productive adult would constitute a full-time curriculum! Plant a garden, read good literature, serve the needy, be politically aware, keep a journal, vote for honest men, develop your talents, etc. The exciting part about leading a child into the real world is that they are self-motivated. The moment I sit down to play the piano, all my children want to play and want me to teach them to play something. No sooner than I begin typing on the computer, I have the whole family “needing” to type. My efforts at writing have, humorous to me, stimulated the production of “books” from my youngest children. Modeling is so much more effective than lecturing.

Studies show that the biggest determining factor for a child’s success in reading in school is if they have seen a parent reading in the home on a regular basis. This is especially true for boys if the parent who reads is their father, rather than their mother. Somehow, the example says far more about the value of reading than endless hours in school reading groups.

In every area, it takes instruction to teach skills to little people. Children need to master the basic academic skills (reading, writing, arithmetic), social manners, music competence, and a host of other abilities and that does take focused concentration and time from mother/teacher to accomplish. It isn’t realized just by living in a family. But shared family life practices and contributes to those skills. Having taught my little girl the numbers and the plus, minus and equal signs and how they worked, she jumped right into figuring out how many plates she needed to set the table using her new skills: (“We have 9 and the boys are gone to college so that is minus 3, so we need six”).

When we think of homeschool, sometimes we get tunnel vision, and think “academics”, “keeping up to speed” and other worrisome concerns that don’t really tell the whole story. Homeschool is the growing and nurturing of fine, upright people.

So, how we treat and value the baby really is the lesson.

Class never dismissed.

(Note: This article was originally written years ago, when my children were young.  It is the most often requested thing I’ve ever written.)

Saturday was my birthday, and my family let me sleep in, a nice treat!  How exciting it was to be awakened with this special breakfast!  If you are not that fond of eggs, here’s how to get the nutrition of eggs without the taste.  With whipped cream (stevia sweetened), blueberries and mashed strawberries, this tastes just like dessert!  Yummy!

Why the name Dutch Babies? Well, all I can imagine is that those little babies raised on Holland’s nutritious milk and delicious cheese must be as plump and wholesome as this dish.  Enjoy!

Dutch Babies

• 4 eggs
• 1 cup milk
• 1 cup whole wheat flour (I prefer “white wheat”)
  
• 1/4 tsp. salt
• 2-3 tablespoons butter or coconut oil (sweeter taste with coconut oil, richer taste with butter)

Choose a cast iron frying pan or a baking dish that is no deeper than 3″.  Cast iron skillet is a great choice, but a baking dish will do.  Put butter in the pan and put it in the oven which has been heated to 425 degrees.  Put eggs and milk in the blender and blend, gradually adding flour.  Remove pan from oven when hot, tipping to spread the butter or oil around the bottom of the pan. Pour in the batter, and return the pan to the hot oven as quickly as possible.  Bake for 20 minutes, until golden brown and crisp on the edges.  Makes one skillet or 9 x 13″  baking dish, which is about 4 servings.  Oooh, delicious!

Cinnamon Apple Dutch Babies

To make this delicious variation, use a heavy cast iron skillet preferably.  Preheat over to 425 degrees. In the iron skillet, saute 2 large apples, sliced thinly, in 1/2 cube of butter until tender and translucent. Sprinkle with 2 teaspoons cinnamon and a sprinkling of sweetener (1/4 cup brown sugar is what the recipe calls for, but I prefer a few tablespoons of honey or maple syrup or 4 drops of liquid stevia). Toss to coat. Put skillet with contents into hot oven to heat up while you mix the batter (recipe above).  Pour batter evenly over the apples and return immediately to the oven.  Bake 15-20 minutes or until golden brown.  It will puff very high in the cast iron skillet!

Easter—a lovely time to focus on the Savior’s commandment to love one another.  This was a rather new and startling way of looking at life for the day in which Jesus lived, where Roman cruelty was the norm.

I put a big blank poster up on the dining room wall, along with some pictures of Jesus, and some markers nearby to encourage everyone to express their feelings of love for each other. It has been fun to watch the comments accumulate, and I catch family members standing and reading wonderful things about themselves!

Simple and easy, yet very effective in helping us all remember how important that commandment is.

Happy Easter!