{"id":1271,"date":"2008-05-19T06:50:56","date_gmt":"2008-05-19T11:50:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/danigirl.ca\/blog\/2008\/05\/19\/doing-it-right\/"},"modified":"2008-05-21T09:28:49","modified_gmt":"2008-05-21T14:28:49","slug":"doing-it-right","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/danigirl.ca\/blog\/2008\/05\/19\/doing-it-right\/","title":{"rendered":"Doing it right"},"content":{"rendered":"

Chris over at Smartmouth Mombie<\/a> tagged me for her most excellent Mother’s Day meme. She said:<\/p>\n

I think the Moms\/Mommies\/Mamas in the blogosphere spend more than enough time admitting our shortcomings and not nearly enough time celebrating our strong points. So, I’m suggesting that on Mother’s Day, or the day after, or at least some time in May, you take a moment and make a list of three things that you do well as a mother and either post it in the comments here or in your own blog.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

She’s so <\/em>right. We really have to find more time to celebrate the things we as mothers are doing right. Confident as I am in my mad mothering skillz most days, I still found it surprisingly difficult to write this post – and not only because I am trying to write it while stuffing the soother back into Lucas’s mouth every two minutes while he fusses on the swing beside me. Three things I’m doing right, in no particular order:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. I’m fairly consistent with rules, routines and discipline. I set limits and impose structure, and stick by them so the boys always know where the lines are drawn and even what to expect from daily routines. I’ve recently begun to perfect my hairy eyeball, a gift from my own mother, so that I can often convey more effective threat of consequences with a single look than I could with 100 words. But I strive to be reasonable, and try to see things from their perspective before meting out discipline.<\/li>\n
  2. The boys know they are loved, by me and Beloved and their extended family and friends. I never miss an opportunity to tell them how much I love them and how wonderful they are. Tristan and Simon both made Mother’s Day ‘stories’ in their classes with fill-in-the-blank statements like “My mommy’s name is” (Simon said, “just mommy”) and “My mommy’s favourite food is” (Tristan said “coffee”). Both of them ended with a variation on the same sentiment: I love my mommy because: she loves me.” Reading that, I felt like I was doing a good job as a mother. Come what may, I promise to always love them and always stand behind them.<\/li>\n
  3. I let the boys play, and I play with them — sometimes. I think I strike a pretty good balance between letting them entertain themselves, inspiring entertainment (nothing like the sudden appearance of fresh bubbles to improve an otherwise boring afternoon) or joining in on the fun. I like adventures as much as they do, and love family walks, visits to the museum, the park or the pool. <\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    Phew, that was harder than I thought. First, all modesty aside, I thought I wouldn’t be able to narrow it down to three — and then once I got going, I found it hard to find three good ones!<\/p>\n

    Now it’s your turn to share with the class. Consider yourself tagged and play along, either in the comments or back at your place. Name three parenting things that you do well.<\/p>\n

    (Edited to add, after two days with ZERO comments: Really? Nobody <\/em>can think of three things they’re doing well??)<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    Chris over at Smartmouth Mombie tagged me for her most excellent Mother’s Day meme. She said: I think the Moms\/Mommies\/Mamas in the blogosphere spend more than enough time admitting our shortcomings and not nearly enough time celebrating our strong points. So, I’m suggesting that on Mother’s Day, or the day after, or at least some … Continue reading “Doing it right”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14,10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1271","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-memes","category-mothering-without-a-licence"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/danigirl.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1271","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/danigirl.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/danigirl.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/danigirl.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/danigirl.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1271"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/danigirl.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1271\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/danigirl.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1271"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/danigirl.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1271"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/danigirl.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1271"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}