Family Bubble Time

I got the chance to serve with a brother last year who introduced the "Family Bubble Time" concept to me along with this lovely poem. The "bubble time" refers to the protected time and space set aside solely for the family. It's the dedicated time without phone calls, emails or disruptions. I love the term "bubble." One text, one email, one phone call and so goes the bubble.

As my kids are getting ready for bed time, wrapping up their weeks long vacation, I remind myself the priority of the new year. Imagine the time and space from the time when we pick up our kids to the time when we tuck them to bed, disconnect with Internet, reconnect with them, heart-to-heart, with our eyes and ears open.

Take a moment to listen today, to what our children have to say . . .

Six Ways to Keep the "Little" in Your Girl

This is the twin book of the one I recommended earlier "Six Ways to Keep the 'Good' in Your Boy." This book reminds me the importance of "playing" with our girls. It is through those playful moments that we connect and through the connection comes the health dialogues that allow us to get to understand her world and to instill the life principles in her little heart. The book mentions about the three phrases (see below) in the parenting season, a good reference for us to keep in mind, so we can set the "phrase-appropriate" parenting goals. 

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The Copycat Phase

Between the age of 2 and 5, your child is developing a set of moral values by copying you. Your daughter will want to model everything you and her father do. In her little brain she is saying, Mommy does it. I want to be like Mom because that feels good. I will do it too. She is acting out a consequential moral behavior. It makes her feel good to be like you. 

The Counseling Phase

Between the age of 6 and 11, your child is developing a set of moral values by asking you why you believe what you believe and do what you do. It is an interactive phase of moral development, characterized by your child’s asking a lot of questions as she considers more variables. In her little brain she is asking, “Why does Mommy do that? I think I want to be like mom, but does it really feel good? Maybe I will do it too, if she can tell me why.” She is beginning to monitor her own conduct based on what she thinks.

The Coaching Phase

From the age of 12 through her adult years, your child is living out a set of moral values, and you’re pretty much an observer. It’s not like you’re in the stands and don’t get to tell her how to play the game of life, but you’re more like a coach. You’re not calling all the shots. It is a phase of reasoning during which she allows her values to begin to have a relationship with her behavior. In her maturing brain she is asking, How do I want to do this? Is there something I believe that will help me decide? Maybe I will do it, if it fits into what I believe. 

Six Ways to Keep the "Good" in Your Boy

Have it occur to you that the solution to get kids off the video game addition is not to ban them from the gaming times, but to guide them to the quest of their life purpose? I love how Dannah Gresh puts it in her book, "Six Ways to Keep the Good in Your Boy".  The book also comes with tips box as shown in the picture. The infor. inside each box is very useful and can be used for reference search to find more resources. Here is an excerpt of the book:

"As I write this, a three-year-old boy in my church has been wearing a homemade cape and sword everywhere he goes.  After seeing him like this several times, I finally asked if he was "Superman."  He wasted no time drawing his sword and shouting to me that he was, in fact, "Bible Man!" (Yahoo!)

From a very young age, boys want to conquer something . . . Gaming, however, gives him a false sense of purpose (and up to 25 percent of boys will actually become addicted to that sensation).  Achieving the next level in the game Call of Duty sends a message to his brain that he's found a sacred purpose.  In the real world, he's sitting on his bed way past bedtime, thwarting his ability to answer to a real, lifelong call of duty. 

And here is probably the most insidious danger of gaming.  You don't want your son to miss out on his real life mission because he has spent the most formative years of his life locked into completing fantasy missions." 

Boundary with Kids

The Future is Now - from "The Boundary with Kids” by Dr. Henry Cloud & Dr. John Townsend

“It was a normal day, but one that would forever change my friend’s parenting. We had finished dinner, and I (Dr. Cloud) was visiting with my friend, Allison, and her husband, Bruce, when she left the dinner table to do some chores. Bruce and I continued to talk until a phone call took him away as well, so I went to see if I could lend Allison a hand. 

I could hear her in their fourteen-year-old son Cameron’s room. I walked in to a scene that jolted me. She was cheerfully putting away clothes and sports equipment and making the bed. She struck up a conversation as if things were normal: “I can’t wait for you to see the pictures from our trip. It was so much —“

“What are you doing?” I asked.

“I’m cleaning up Cameron’s room,” she said. “What does it look like I’m doing?”

“You are what?”

“I told you. I’m cleaning up his room. Why are you looking at me like that?”

All I could do was to share with her the vision in my head. “I just feel sorry for Cameron’s future wife.”

Allison straightened up, frozen for a moment, and then hurried from the room. I walked into the hall to see her standing there motionless. Not knowing what to say, I said nothing. After a few moments, she looked at me and said, “I’ve never thought about it that way.”

Not have most of us. We parent in the present without thinking about the future. We usually deal with the problems at hand . . . But one goal of parenting is to keep an eye on the future. We are raising our children to be responsible adults.