Spending some time on the farm

and it is so worth it!

In an effort to appease the masses, and make life around here more tolerable, I went back to "mom of young ones mode" (when you deal with so many teenagers it is easy to forget some of the basics for the little ones). What do cranky children, squabbling children need? Fresh air, work and focused time from mom. I know it is so obvious and yet it is so easy to get distracted. I have been so busy with church stuff, older kids, chauffeuring, keeping up with the house, and taking care of our old sick dog, that I have not been doing the things with my little people, that made my big people so wonderful. Did that make any sense?

Well, I've fixed it. When my big kids were small we had a schedule. Not just for mealtimes and chores, but for fun stuff too. Mondays we went to the library, Tuesdays we went exploring, Wednesdays we baked and did art at home, you get it. As everyone else got older, I realized Annie and Geoffrey live under a different regime. The "Do I really have to get up off the couch?" regime. In fact when Geoffrey wants me to play superheros or army guys with him, I always ask to be the corpse. Or sometimes the one that has been put under an evil spell and can't move. He is on to me though.

The other day I made a comment about "Farmer Boy". Since my comment was not something that ever made it to the TV series, Annie and Geoffrey didn't know what I was talking about. Huh? How did I forget to read the "Little House" books to these guys. Reading to my kids is one of the few things as a mom I'm good at. It is something I never budge or compromise on. You can guess what we did for the next hour. Chapter after chapter, and they loved it. Even though he wasn't excited at first, I let Geoffrey draw on the floor while I read. By chapter 3 he was snuggled up with me and I was in "mommy heaven".

I bring this up because I realized I was the one missing out! Annie and Geoffrey are both readers. They do get plenty of attention from me and my better half, but I am happier when I spend that type of time with them. There has not been a skirmish since we started reading these books again.

I realize almost all of my best memories with my little ones revolve around reading. Whether it is trying to make "turkish delight", or finding out that Chris and Chandler had been stashing food and camping supplies in a gully near our neighborhood after reading Mark Twain to them. Maybe the look on my kids faces when the "Lord of the Rings" movies came out and they saw how scary "Orks" really are. You see, their father had told them orks were really the size of footballs. He was reading them the books at bedtime and they kept getting scared.

I have spent most of my pregnancies on bed rest for weeks and weeks at a time. When I was pregnant with Seth, Chris and Chandler were 5 and 3. Not exactly sedentary ages for little boys. I felt so bad that I couldn't get them out to do anything. The other day Chandler mentioned that he really missed being 3. I asked why, he said," Remember how we were snuggle buddies every day. You let me just lie around in bed with you and read, do puzzles or color. That was the happiest time of my life." What a great kid.

We are going to do an experiment tonight to see if you really can fit an entire glass of popcorn into a full glass of milk like Almanzo Wilder says you can. If you haven't shared a great read with your kids in a while, I recommend it. If you only have big people, ask them for a suggestion and read one of their favs. If you don't have big or little people around then reread your favorite book from when you were a child.