I had a growing list this summer of activities I wanted to do with the girls. As the days flew by, my list grew longer.
We seemed to have a really nice summer routine going, but I sometimes felt myself anxious inside that my great intentions of activites fell by the wayside.
One particular forced activity stopped me in my tracks and reminded me of the oh so important adage of staying in “the moment.”
It was such a great activity and the summer was counting down so quickly … I really wanted to get it in. And if I dare be completely honest … it was great blog material too!
And now I am blogging about it … but as a “don’t” instead of a “do.” Well, kind of. I “do” recommend the activity … but I also recommend doing it at the right time.
I completely choose the wrong day … I think I may have had a photo shoot in the morning, so my mom was with the girls in the morning and had kept them busy and stimulated.
So by the time I get at them, it’s high noon, and way hotter than forecasted. So let’s see here … I’ve got hungry, hot, cranky girls … but yeah, perfect time for an activity!
A month before, I had read about a “listening walk” here and thought it’d be right up my girls alley. So I tagged it, ordered the book … and put it on my to-do list. Okay, and seriously? My “to-do” list?
So here are the photos I took while convincing the girls they’d really love this activity …
Supplies:
The idea of the egg is to have everyone close their eyes when they’re holding it. It’s suppose to help them concentrate on what they’re listening to.
They bought it at first …
And here’s where the crank set in …
We have a pretty large piece of property with a path that surrounds part of it, so I figured we’d just go around the path.
We hadn’t gotten very far before the “crank” set in. They were hot, so I told them to get undressed. You can do that in your own yard, right? And besides, I was desperate at that point.
It was shortly after the strip-tease when I knew they were done. I’d packed lunch and figured we’d have it half way through our walk.
Plan B had us having lunch two minutes into our walk! They complained the whole time and wanted to know why we couldn’t just eat inside.
I finally huffed that “fine, let’s just go in!” We packed everything up and started inside … when Piper looked at me and said, “you sad mom?”
Yeah … as a matter of fact I was sad. And in my huff, I kind of wanted them to know it. You know … in one of those awesome mom-of-the-year moments.
It wasn’t until a bit later when I realized … remembered really … this was totally an activity that I wanted to do. And not that they wouldn’t have wanted to … but they didn’t want to at that moment, and I should have honored that.
Pick your battles, right?
I didn’t have to mark this off my to-do list. It could’ve stayed on there forever.
The right moment would come … and we all would’ve enjoyed it much more at that point.
I’m reminded of something I read a long time ago. It was written by Harry Connick Jr, on parenting. He told a story how he really wanted to go to the park with his little girl, but she stopped before they got to the car {or park … can’t remember exactly} and was fascinated by some small rocks and really didn’t want to go to the park. He started fussing and moaning that it was getting late and they really needed to get going or they’d never make it to the park … when he realized that it didn’t matter whether they went to the park or not. What mattered is that she’d remember that time with him.
The gift I’d like to unwrap for you today … is the small reminder to stay in the moment. Why fight and argue over something we want to do? It’s these small moments, with us in them, that they are going to remember.
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