Random Sunday thoughts.

It's the first Sunday after Christmas and I'm sitting at home with Nicholas, helping him rest. He needs rest because he lost his voice yesterday. It might have been all the yelling and excitement of having his telescope put together and getting to look through it and see stars. It might also be a cold. So to be safe, I stayed home from church with him to rest.

We watched GI Joe - the original one from the 80s - for 3 hours. I had so much fun with him.

Which made me think: What matters the most for me with my children?

The caramel might have turned out differently than I wanted, but it was more important that the kids and I did it together - that we had fun together and spent time doing something. The memories matter more than the caramel.

The answer: Having fun with them, raising them right, and showing them that I love them.

Those three things don't always go well together. Sometimes we have to punish so that they know they pushed their limits. Consequences come because I love my kids. I want them to understand there are limits. Consequences are the natural thing that follows when you break the limits. Rewards - good consequences - come when I see wonderful things happening.

So my New Year's Resolution to my children - the one about them - is that I will spend more time showing them that I love them. It's important. probably the most important thing I will do from here on out.

I mean more than just telling them that I love them. Showing love is totally different from saying love. They should know I love them when they jump at me and I catch them. When we cuddle on the couch, in a fort, or on a chair and read. When we pray together at night. When I take them outside and hike and go slowly so they can enjoy everything. We go on walks and take our time. When I slow our life down so that they have time to enjoy things.

It means that I have to focus on them - almost wholly - when they are awake. Not my computer, not my job, not work. Just on them.

This might mean less "stuff" going on at the Wunderlich house. But that's fine. It might mean more time outside- which is awesome. But what it means is more time doing the love stuff and less time just saying love.

It's going to be the one thing I can do for them that's going to matter the most in the long run.

Adolescent brains....

There's an interesting article over on Huffington Post today about adolescent brains and how they form ideas. The article states that so much emphasis has been placed on providing rich, stimulating environments for youngsters as their brain develops, that people have forgotten that the brain still develops as people get older.

Specifically, the adolescent brain is still developing the major pathways for making decisions. So how we, as parents, deal with their good - and bad - decisions will help them develop those pathways.

I wish there was a little more substance to the article: A little more research on how best to support these developing brains. Everyone seems to agree how to support younger brain development - but the older brain development doesn't get as many recommendations. I wonder if this is because people are scared of making others mad?

After all, if science came out and said something like, "When adolescent brains are developing, they need clear divisions between good and bad," - can you imagine the firestorm that would stir up? I certainly can.

It's funny that any number of political science and humanities studies have shown that the best indicator of how people behave and what beliefs they hold is......what their parents hold and how their parents behave. Is it possible that by surrounding adolescents with people who behave in "good" ways will make them good? The answer seems to be yes.

And if that's the case - then why would we surround our children with questionable things? Twerking and superstars who can't follow the rules of decency (like don't do drugs, don't spit on people, don't call people names) are not the people we want around our children. We want our children - especially our adolescents - around people who value themselves, who use their brains intelligently, and who behave with grace and friendliness.

If we, as adults, think we get influenced by our friends and surroundings - imagine how much more adolescents and children are influenced by theirs.

We have a role to play as parents - we must control what our children have access to. I'm not advocating full on censorship. But I'm advocating limiting access. We wouldn't let our children watch porn - so why let them read it in a book? We wouldn't want our children standing by while someone hurts another person - so why teach our children to do that with uber-violent video games? These are all things that we, as parents, can control.

But most of all, we can control what we tell and show our children through ourselves and the friends we have around.

If adolescent brains are still developing, just like toddler brains, then we need to be more careful, not less, with what we expose our children to.

Amazon subscribe and save/Amazon Mom.

I just discovered- and I know I'm late to the party - Amazon's Subscribe and Save feature. It's like Costco - but it delivers on a schedule to your house. For people like me - who hate to go to Costco with their kids but have no other option - this can save a bunch of time. I no longer have to deal with the toilet paper taking up so much of the cart that there's no room for everything else.

I also don't have to deal with going to Costco for it.

Best of all - I get 20% off my purchases.

How? It's easy.

First, sign up for the Amazon Subscribe and Save feature. Click here for a link.

Then sign up for Amazon Mom.

Then schedule your items so at least 5 arrive in each batch. If less than 5 arrive, you get 5% off. If 5 or more arrive, you get 20% off.

I've scheduled our toilet paper, clorox wipes, epsom salts, GF non-perishables (flour substitute, pasta), potatoes, soap, bottled water, kid's juice boxes. paper towels, laundry soap, baking soda (because we use it all the time - for lots of different things), vinegar (because it's used all the time too), lemons (my tree doesn't produce enough for me), shampoo, deodorant, toothpaste, and all kinds of fun stuff through here.

I no longer have to worry about these things - or forgetting them when I head to the store. They will simply show up on their scheduled times and at my house. I don't have to do anything else.

I'm loving this. It's great.

Thanksgiving - a bit late.

Who doesn't like Thanksgiving? I know the blog post is a bit late, like by a month, but better late than never. I'm going to try and write a blog a day, it's my new goal. I think I'm going to have to spend some nights just writing blog posts and scheduling them out. Hopefully they stay relevant for when I schedule them out. I hear successful bloggers do that - and I do it on the homeschool blog (www.wunderfulhomeschool.wordpress.com). Just not here. But I'm going to try.

I'm going to have to write the posts before I sit down and watch West Wing at night. It's my version of ESPN (watch it, get absorbed, then do nothing else). I don't know what it says that West Wing is my ESPN, but oh well. We had Thanksgiving with family. It was great. My sister takes great pictures and let all the kids jump on her (thanks Aunt Debby). I don't really let the kids do that right now because my stomach is still healing from the appendectomy. The incision pain and recovery might be less with the laproscopic procedure, but they still go through your stomach muscles which makes the recover just like a c-section. Except no new baby to take care of. Just you taking care of you - and being super sore and unable to do normal things like sit up. Thanksgiving was fun. We had deviled eggs, turkey, cranberry sauce - most of the traditional stuff. I made honey cornbread from scratch and it was amazingly good. I really liked it. So did the kids, and it has become somewhat of a regular thing here. Just some cornmeal, eggs, water, and honey. It's super easy and super good. Abby ate enough cranberry sauce to float a small boat. She's still eating it. I get it on sale after Thanksgiving because she likes it so much. Then she eats it for two months, then stops again until the next Thanksgiving. Nicholas just grazes, then begs his grandmother for ice cream - which she gives to him. It's been cold outside, but that doesn't stop my kids from jumping on the trampoline in the freezing cold. They find ice all over the yard, then move it to the trampoline and jump to break it. While in shorts and short sleeved shirts. Wouldn't it be fun to be that insensitive to weather again? Maybe not. But they love it and weather doesn't seem to cause them any difficulty. Well, it's Christmas season and we are going to be decorating right up until Christmas Eve. I love Christmas and decorating. I turn on the Christmas carols as soon as we leave my mom's house after Thanksgiving. And then they stay on until Epiphany. I love Christmas. So onto one of my most favorite times of the year.