be a wonderful mother

I want to remember to get her a goldfish, take her to the beach, and give her at least one sibling. She’s only 8 weeks old tomorrow, so I’ll be listing fun things like these under this goal to help me remember all the things I want to do with and for her.

I suppose being a wonderful mother is broad. So for the time being my area of focus is going to be ‘patience’. Our little girl is approx. 14 months so this is a must! Tackle it now and hopefully it will assist in the future. Although I’m sure all of you other mothers with older children are able to tell me you never get any one thing pegged and you change as they do.

Patrick needs to hear more encouragement and less condemnation. I SO want him to be ok!

He is SUCH a great kid. I am so happy with all of my children. I just always feel that I could do better. I just hope that I have had a lot to do with how wonderful my kids are. The world is a nicer place because they’re in it!!

i have had so much fun with my kids since school has been out for xmas vacation. i love them so much!!

I will never give up on my son!

i helped them figure out registration at the junior college yesterday. wrapped a bunch more gifts for them. sent them nice texts.

For awhile now, I’ve been teaching our 23 month old two primary things in the learning discipline. One, she’s got to put her toys away before meal times, sleeping times (1 nap time and sleeping at night), and doing anything she enjoys (watch Elmo, go outside, play with Play-doh). It’s isn’t about me wanting things to be tidy. It’s about her learning to be responsible for her things. Second, she’s learning that even if she is reaching the age where she wants to assert independence, she cannot do this by yelling and screaming (throwing tantrums). Not only will that get her no where, but that may earn her a time-out. Since I am extremely predictable in execution, she’s done quite well with the first lesson, especially. She’s making progress with the second.

I know the hubby and I won’t hear the pitter patter of little feet any time soon (at least not for nine months…= P), but I so want to be a good mommy. Already I’m amazingly in love with these little people that I haven’t met and that don’t even exist yet. How crazy is that?

Anyway, there are little things from my childhood that I don’t want my kids to miss out on. Things that my mom made so much fun for my brother and me – like hopscotch, couch cushion forts, and mixing corn starch, water, and food coloring to make this goopy pile of fun. If I forget to do these things with my kids I will be a total failure = )

She went through a stage where she’d wake up several times in the night screaming, due at least in part to separation anxiety. When she was 12 1/2 months old, I decided to instigate the Ferber sleep training method. That is, we let her cry herself back to sleep. Thought the first few nights might be hellish, but it wasn’t all that bad. She sleeps 10-11 hours overnight. Yay! Still not much of a napper though. Takes two naps a day, about half an hour a piece.