Once Upon a Child's Heart

Your Challenge:    Tell a "That's Good.  That's Bad."  story with your children this week.  Report back by commenting on this post and tell how it went. Story Tip:  Try this game on Christmas Eve when kids are having trouble sleeping. Tonight at dinner we played a new story game.  It was brilliant!  We came up with it on the fly.  With two boys and one on the way dinner discussion can often be about bodily functions, body parts, or just plain fighting.  It can drive the Bug with Black Spots and I crazy.  We try to come to the table prepared with a good question or topic for discussion.  Tonight we got talking about books and somehow a story that the boys really enjoy came up.  It’s called “That’s Good, That’s Bad” by Margery Cuyler .  The boys clearly enjoy this story.  We decided to make up our own version of the story at the dinner table.  Reading the book would be a great idea for your family....

If there is one thing that pushes me over the edge with my kids it's their incessant "It's not fair!"  I've come to the point where I don't even no what to say to that statement anymore.  Of course it's not fair.  Life never is.  Besides, I don't want it to be fair IF fair means every one gets the exact same thing.  Because to me that doesn't seem fair.  If one child gets a broken leg it's silly to break the other child's leg too. Right?  For me I'm realizing that fair means each child gets uniquely what he or she needs not necessarily what they want.  Which is never enough for them anyway.  Can you relate? On the other hand, I have one child that is always hungry.  He eats because he's bored and needs stimulation and sometimes lacks a little imagination to supply these things for himself.  Should I just feed him to keep him busy and shut him up?   I have another child who gets so engaged in what he's doing he doesn't w...

In preparation for an upcoming post I wanted to share a bit of my story journey with you. In my pursuit to teach my first born son, Thing One, through his insatiable desire for stories I stumbled across a book called "Healing Stories for Challenging Behaviors" by Susan Perrow published by Hawthorn Press, Gloucestershire .  This book was so affirming to me.  It encouraged me to make up stories to tell my boys that would address specific problems I was having with them.  Or even to make up stories to address problems we were having in our relationships with each other.  After a while this developed into making up stories to hopefully preempt problems, like the story I'm going to share with you in my next post. A Healing Story is just that, a story to heal.  In some cases Healing Stories can work where medicine can't.  They aren't for healing broken arms or burns of course.  They are for wounds of the heart, soul and mind.  At the very least Hea...

Today I am sharing, for the first time I might add, a story I have written.  I'm a little nervous about this.  It feels super vulnerable. So be kind to me :)  It's a story for St. Nicholas Day, which is tomorrow.  If you do nothing else for this day at least read this story.   Oh!  I've added a "Print Friendly" button to the bottom of my posts so you can print this story out and read it more easily to your Littles and Bigs. I love the imagination that St. Nick brings to children.  The stories around him are full of fantasy and mystery.  They create an opportunity to ponder the Mystery of Christ and the inner workings of our hearts.  I tell this story, "St. Nick and The Sausage Machine", on St. Nicholas Eve in anticipation of his visit the next morning.  And let me tell you it's a gripping story.  My boys are on the edge of their seats every time!  Then afterwards we sprinkle special magical glitter dust on our doorste...

Okay friends, I have a confession to make.  Santa doesn’t come to my family’s house.  Well, at least not on Christmas day.  No, we think Santa is special enough to have his very own day!  December 6 th .  It’s the first thing my family changed when we started to revive our Advent season.  After reading Gertrud Mueller Nelson’s book “To Dance with God” I fell in love with St. Nicholas, AKA, Santa Clause.  St. Nick is a type of Christ.  If you use him properly he can point wonderfully to Christ on Christmas.  Much like John the Baptist did for Christ on Easter.  If you want to know more about Santa Clause here is a site called, St. Nicholas Center: discovering the truth about Santa Claus , that Gertrud Mueller Nelson herself directed me to.  Ms. Nelson said she has a play about the very same story I'm going to share in my next post on this site.  Of course you should read Gertrud Mueller Nelson’s book.  It is very inspirin...