Can you all believe we up to Day Number 12?  I can’t believe it either!  Thank you so much to all of my readers for keeping up with this series.    This blog had almost 19,000 hits last month, so I know there are many of you out there reading along and I want you to know I treasure you all.

Today we are going to talk about warmth.  Warmth is a quality often mentioned in Waldorf and anthroposophic circles, and seems to get little attention outside of these realms.  This is a shame, because of the importance warmth has in the development of a child’s senses. 

I wrote this in a post regarding the twelve senses as seen by Rudolf Steiner:

“The Sense of Warmth –   Donna Simmons calls this one a gateway to The Higher Senses.  This sense does not fully develop until age 9 and can literally cause a hardening of creativity and new thought as the child matures, but also can refer to a literal inability of the child to be able to tell if they are hot or cold.  Warmth implies not only physical warmth, but warmth on a soul level.  Joy, humor, love, connection are all important developers of this sense along with PROTECTION from extreme and garish sensory experiences that would cause hardening.  This is a very important sense, and children need help with protecting this sense until the age of 9 or 10, so much longer than many parents think!”

I think this notion of warmth really feeds off our last post regarding the home; it is one of those qualities most needed in the  home and in the development of the child.

So, we can look at  two separate ways of generating “warmth”.  One is to think about physical warmth.  I recently wrote an entire post about mainly physical  warmth here:  https://theparentingpassageway.com/2009/08/27/what-happens-if-i-dont-keep-my-child-warm/

It is very important to keep children warm as  their own sense of temperature equilibrium really does not become well-established until after age nine!  So yes, this means woolens and silks and hats and layers! 

But I think the other thing to think about sincerely is how to convey EMOTIONAL warmth to our children.  How many times a day do we laugh with our children?  Hug our children or have them sit on our lap?  Smile at our children?  Say positive and encouraging things to our children?

So, my three-day challenge to you is this:

Set a goal for how many times a day you are going to try to laugh, hug, hold, smile and say positive things to your child and act on it!   This may seem very stilted and forced, but sometimes we all need that structure in order to make a behavior more automatic.   See after three days if there is a difference in not only you and your children, but in the peacefulness of your household.  Can you also  do this with your spouse?  How many encouraging things do you say to him each day?  How many times do you walk by him and touch his hand or touch him on the back or give him a kiss? 

Try it for three short days, Monday through Wednesday this week,  and let me know how it goes!

Many blessings,

Carrie

This is a topic near and dear to my heart: making your home work for you.  This whole notion of “What makes a home a home?” is profoundly interesting to me!

This probably has more to do with the “intangibles”:  the way a home feels when you walk into it.  Is there warmth, joy, laughter, playfulness – or is it all tense, anger, bitterness, misery? 

Your own inner work is of utmost importance in maintaining your home as a place of joy, humor and warmth.  How YOU feel cared for is an important part.  There was a post earlier in this series regarding how to make yourself a priority; I believe this is important to continue to try to find ways to honor yourself and the wonderful parent that you are.  Quiet confidence gives a great strength and stability to the home.

So, when we think of “home” and cleaning up, let’s clean up ourselves first.  Discern the essentials for your family!  Do you have a Family Mission Statement?  Here is that post:  https://theparentingpassageway.com/2009/05/08/creating-a-family-mission-statement/

Here is our Family Mission Statement:

Our family will be a place of KINDNESS, as we love one another, help one another, and are gentle and patient with one another in words and actions.

(“Don’t ever forget kindness and truth. Wear them like a necklace. Write them on your heart as if on a tablet.” Proverbs 3:3 and “Someone with a quick temper does foolish things, but someone with understanding remains calm.” Proverbs 14:17).

Our family will be a place of POSITIVE ATTITUDES as we have hope, cheerfulness and encouragement for each other in all situations and challenges.

(“Worry is a heavy load, but a kind word cheers you up.” Proverbs 12:25 and “Pleasant words are like a honeycomb, making people happy and healthy.” Proverbs 16:24)

Our family will be one of INTEGRITY as we do what we say we are going to do and act in honesty and loyalty to one another.

(“The good people who live honest lives will be a blessing to their children.” Proverbs 20:7)

You can write something in accordance with your own spiritual beliefs!  Let your Family Mission Statement reflect the utmost priorities of your family!

Let’s think about “de-cluttering” in how we take care of OURSELVES; can we discern the essentials and leave the non-essentials behind?  Have we been ignoring the essentials in regards to ourselves?    Are you going to bed and getting enough rest?  Are you eating well?  Keeping up with your own doctor’s appointments?  Are you exercising at all (and no, walking at the pace of a two-year-old who stops every foot to examine things on the ground probably does not qualify to increase your own cardiovascular health!)  How could you work these things into your rhythm?  Could your spouse or partner help make this happen?

Now we are onto the physical beauty that is our home!  I think the issue is that as homeschooling mothers we are in our home ALL DAY, so the physical way our home looks and feels can really affect us! 

We have looked in the past on this blog at de-cluttering your home and also how to homeschool and have a clean house.  Those posts are here:

https://theparentingpassageway.com/2009/05/11/housecleaning-and-homeschooling/

https://theparentingpassageway.com/2009/09/12/is-your-home-a-sanctuary/

I also encourage all of you to not only come up with a rhythm for your de-cluttering and your cleaning, but for chores for your children.  In a homeschooling family, all the housecleaning cannot be just on the mother.  It takes a team!  That being said, many children need you to do chores WITH them until the nine-year-change at least.  We are doing things TOGETHER and you are singing and having FUN!  That is what makes a home a home; the beauty of caring for one another!

But most of all, remember a home is built of those soul qualities.  One book that may be of use to you all is “The Spiritual Tasks of the Homemaker”.  For a study of this book, please see AnthroMama’s blog here: http://anthromama.wordpress.com/spiritual-tasks-of-the-homemaker-study/

Many blessings,

Carrie

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This is the third and final installment of “Day Number 10” of our series “20 Days Toward Being A More Mindful Mother”.  I just wanted to briefly cover the seven and eight year olds.  These are ages that are often seen as “older” in our society, and I am here to tell you these ages still need protection and also require appropriate developmental expectations.

Here is a prior post to ponder:  https://theparentingpassageway.com/2009/04/08/the-seven-and-eight-year-old-still-a-need-for-protection/

Realistic Expectations for the Seven-Year-Old:

• EXPECT a seven-year-old still needs PROTECTION of their senses and of how much they are doing in any one day.  A seven-year-old wants to do everything and anything, but as the Gesell Institute points out, a hallmark of the seven-year-old is fatigue.  They need you to establish good bedtimes (7:30 is not too early for a busy seven-year-old!) and they need you to help them limit their activities.
• EXPECT physical movement to still  be REALLY important, and I am not talking about organized sports.  I am talking about PLAYING and being outside in nature where they create the games themselves.  Seven-year-olds should still be playing!  The Gesell Institute mentions that adult supervision is still important when they play because sevens become excited and wild which can often end in “destruction of  material or personal altercation.”  Also, be aware many seven-year-olds are not too compassionate of those they deem “different” and while they thrive on group praise per Gesell Institute, most sevens also do not seem to “need” friends the way they did when they were six.
• EXPECT a seven-year-olds to be more contained and quiet than at six, but also expect that they tend to cry easily “at any, every, or even no provocation.”  Be careful becoming irritable or critical of the people a seven-year-old says is picking on them or hates them….Sevens rather like being gloomy and complaining.  Try not to take it too seriously, unless you really do think it is a bullying issue at school or something else more serious.  However, not taking it too seriously does not mean you do not treat the complaints that no one likes me, etc, etc as if they are real.  The feelings are real to your child!  So, don’t get dragged too far into it all, but also acknowledge how your child feels.
• EXPECT a seven-year-old to  think about death, dying, killing, violence.  This is why the archetypal fairy tales found in the Waldorf curriculum are wonderful for this age.  Take all the wild talk calmly!  You can sometimes say something to the effect that children think these things, but add in that, “Of course we wouldn’t do that here in our house.”
• EXPECT the fear stages that go with many seven-year-olds.  A seven-year-old is likely to be fearful of many things; again, these feelings are real to the child so you can be sympathetic and compassionate without being completely dragged into it all.  Don’t YOU be frightened of your child’s fears; that provides the child no sense of security at all!
• EXPECT that a seven-year-old still will most likely touch, manipulate and play with anything that catches their eye.
• EXPECT most sevens to be procrastinators, have short memory spans per Gesell (which makes perfect sense to we Waldorf people that memory is forming and being placed into play as something important now); and expect that they have a tendency to get very distracted easily.  Sevens also try to be perfect and need reminding that no one is perfect or should be perfect.
• EXPECT your seven-year-old to argue with you in a sense, asking “Why?”  “Why?” over and over, more almost as a stalling technique for whatever you asked them to do.  Do NOT overtalk to them!  If you need help, see my post entitled, “Stop Talking!  (”https://theparentingpassageway.com/2009/04/14/stop-talking/)  But do make sure your child has heard you- sometimes they really don’t hear you!

Realistic Expectations for the Eight-Year-Old:

On to Day Number Eleven!

Carrie