Many of the stories though made me kinda nervous for what's to come with my children and made me think how am I going to teach them that or see them through heartache or pain. Great stories for pondering and planning too.
This past weekend my kids made some big accomplishments at least in my eyes. My son played soccer in his last game of soccer...for about 30 seconds! He played for about 5 minutes in his first game and got scared. He wouldn't play in any of his other games. My son gets scared, nervous intimidated with larger crowds of people watching him. He's in gymnastics now, but that took several months for him to get used to plus it's an individual sport not really a team sport like soccer is. We'll try again maybe when he's in kindergarten when he's the older child on the team not the youngest. Though many people think he's older like 5 or 6 because he's tall, but he's only 4.My son was already comparing himself - not being fast enough - even though it didn't really matter. He notices that stuff very easily so it reminded me of the stories in "Do Angels Wear Glasses" and "The Comparison Monster." How will I teach my son not to compare himself so much or worry about being the best at everything? These stories helped me think about what I can do to help him see what's really important like how proud of him we were for trying, for participating in the cheer willingly, giving fives to the other team, passing out snacks. He was so proud of his medal too. =D
Having another child, my daughter especially, really helped me to learn to stop the Comparison Monster in myself because she is so stubborn unlike my son was. She's not the best listener and jokes around a lot even at the young age of 2! It's getting a lot easier as we have made adjustments in our teaching with her. When I see other parents talk of struggles or see them struggle in the stores, I just smile knowingly. Each situation and stage of life is different. Each person has their own qualities that make them better with certain parenting skills. Instead of comparing oh I know what I would do in that situation, I just smile and cheer for them inside because they are doing the best they can. Hopefully parents will look at me the same why when my kids are sliding across the store floor, climbing in the check out lines, crying because I buckled them in, etc.
A nice quotation from the "Is There a Manual?" for this section, "There is no such thing as a perfect parent so just be a real one." ~ Sue Atkins, reminds me to do the best I can, focus on making memories (like in "Mama, Will you Dry my Hair?" and teaching my children to grow up the best they can to focus on their "character not capabilities."
My favorite section was "All in a Day's Work" with stories of being super mom and juggling it all. In a different section there was a cartoon about before kids and all the things we got done and then after kids, you're proud of yourself when you eat lunch. =) This is still something I am working on, not being able to accomplish as many things in a short amounts of time. I feel like I always have 20 things started and I'd be lucky to finish 1 thing.
I wouldn't have it any other way. I wouldn't trade my struggles with my children or parenthood with anyone else. I'm grateful for these experiences especially being able to share with others my stories.
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