Positive Reinforcement for Mommy

It was Saturday, and I was doing what I do most weekends: laundry. It had been a long week, and I was at least grateful for the sunshine streaming through the upstairs bedrooms as I collected dirty clothes from hampers. That's when I saw it. In my sons' bedroom, with the wrinkled bedsheets, the floor littered with toys and action figures, I found a piece of paper with a message written on it:

I just about dropped my armful of laundry. My heart skipped a beat. You other mommies know that motherhood can sometimes feel like a thankless job. You can go for days, plodding along, wondering if you're doing anything right. Then a child will give you a sticky kiss on the cheek, or make you a mud pie with a dandelion stuck in the middle, and your heart will overflow and you will almost feel embarrassed that you ever doubted this is the best job in the world.

The more I stared at the note, the more puzzled I became. The problem was, for the last few days, I don't think I have been very nice at all. I scolded the kids a lot. I lost my patience with their bickering. On Wednesday, two of my sons didn't have clean socks in their drawer and had to dig out some day-old socks. (Yuck). I didn't spend as much time with them as I wanted. I burnt dinner. I was "too busy" doing other things. Bedtime stories got skipped because I was at the end of my rope.

Is it possible my kids have picked up on the idea of positive reinforcement? When my first child was born, I remember hearing the advice, "You've gotta catch your kids doing something good," and I had taken that to heart. When my tiny one was sputtering out half his mashed up baby food onto his high chair, or flinging peas across the room, what did I say?

"You're such a good eater!"

And it continued as they got older. If they threw a temper tantrum, I was quick to forgive, and more than happy to praise them when they calmed down and said they were sorry.

I guess I just didn't want to nag my kids. And I didn't want to spend my time correcting them (unless it was really necessary.) So instead of focusing on the negative, I tried focusing on the positive.

"I know you broke my lamp, but I'm just glad you didn't get hurt by the broken glass!" I'd say, as I handed them a broom and dustpan.

But now the tables have been turned. I've been afforded grace by my little boy, who chose to turn a blind eye to the negative and focus on the positive. My heart is overflowing, and even though I will go back to the drudgery of washing, drying, folding and putting away clothes,  I will have a spring in my step and know that today marks the beginning of a new week. And I'll start it off knowing that my son sees something good in me, something redeeming. And starting today, I can try again to be the Mommy he knows I can be.

Snow My Goodness!

It's been called Snowmageddon, Snowpocalypse, snOMG ... the Midwest has been pummeled by a blizzard of snownormous proportions. You betcha, we've earned the right to tell our grandkids about today. We'll sit back in our rocking chairs, roll back our eyes and say, "I remember that winter we had, back in 2011 ..."

After hours of howling wind, and even snow thunder and lightning (which is quite possibly the coolest thing I've never seen until last night), we awoke to a frozen white world. You had that feeling of accidentally finding yourself in a house that was lowered into the ground, the way the piles of snow came up to an unnatural height just below the windows. Opening our back door to let the dog out, we found a flat wall of snow that had built up a few feet against the cold metal door. "Wait," said my 10 year old, still a little groggy with sleep, "isn't this more snow than we needed?"

Snow days are thousands times more precious than a scheduled day off. With the bustling schedule instantly wiped clean, time was created for more important things like painting, playing games and of course, snow play. My husband spent three hours first with a shovel, then with a borrowed snowblower to carve out precise snow canyons, under the false pretense that we could get our cars out. But since the plows didn't come around until mid-afternoon, the cars stayed put. And who needed anything? Everything was right here. Our cabinets and fridge were well-stocked and the schoolchildren visited one another's yards, to compare who had the highest snowdrifts. I tried not to giggle when my husband nervously paced as he watched the children's gloved and mittened hands chip away at his hours of labor in our driveway. "T-try not to put all that snow back in the driveway!" he yelled out the back door, a little too loudly. The kids all froze instantaneously, many pairs of eyes glancing at him warily. Were they in trouble? "But—have a good time!!" my husband offered as a reprieve. The kids continued their play, but a bit more carefully this time.

I want to say it was the best snow day ever. But I can't. Because you see, school has been called off tomorrow, too. So I can only say that today was the best snow day so far.