How to raise kids that are HONEST and KIND with each other.

Our oldest daughter was the first to leave home for college. A thousand miles away she called us. “Mom, dad,” she said, “My professor is 180 degrees diametrically opposed to everything you’ve ever taught me.” We had to think quickly. If we over-reacted she might never feel safe in sharing the truth with us again. If we didn’t react at all, she might think we actually agreed with her professor. It was time to practice what we’d always preached.

When Ephesians 4 speaks of growing mature in every way it says we must, “speak the truth in love.” But many times one or the other pulls for our affection. If we’ve been hurt, we want truth. We want the hammer of justice to come down hard on the person who has wronged us. If we’ve done the hurting then we say, “God is love. You have to forgive me.” Which is right? And the answer is… yes!

Teaching our kids to be HONEST and KIND isn’t done overnight. Here are six keys:

• You must model it. You knew that was coming. If you two are screaming at each don’t expect your kids to be nice to each other. Or how about this one. Have you ever said seriously, “don’t tell your father”?
• Be HONEST. This is like the first one. You must practice being truthful to your kids. When they are young do you tell them little “white lies” because it’s easier than the truth? It’s ok to say, I’ll tell you more when the time is right. But to say, “I don’t know” if you do, or “they were out,” when they weren’t, eventually catches up to you. Tell them the truth, even when it’s hard.
• Be KIND. I remember the days of yelling at my kids. Most of the time, I was probably right. They should have listened or stopped or done what I asked. But as we learned to parent with a gently and loving voice we began teaching our kids kindness. Because true kindness isn’t just when everything is great. In fact you can discipline nicely. “I’m so sorry you chose to do that. We really wanted you to be able to be with us, but now you are going to have to stay home.”
• Place value in HONEST and KIND. If you’re like me you’re going to mess up with your spouse or your kids. If it’s important, then it’s important enough to say I’m sorry, please forgive me.
• Teach them what to say and how to say it. Teach your kids phrases for how they might approach a hard conversation. If they need to tell someone something truthful but hard, coach them up.
• Use family meetings and after dinner conversation to cast vision. Family meetings are great opportunities to ask, “What kind of a family do we want to be.” It’s hard to always be honest, but if you’ve decided together as a family, “We are going to do this,” it’s way more likely to happen.

It’s almost a lost art to speak truth in love. As a culture we are angry. So when we speak truth we feel justified to do so in anger. Ephesians 4 doesn’t give you license to be “brutally” honest with those closest to you. On the other hand if we choose to be kind we assume it means we can’t be honest. Instead let’s teach our kids to be HONEST with each other and to do it with KINDNESS! How have you seen this lived out in your home? What helped your kids live out Ephesians 4?

Sharing in the Sandbox (Part 2)

Koffee With Kelli

Good morning and thanks so much for joining me again this morning. If you didn’t get a chance to read yesterday’s blog, you might want to go back and read that first, otherwise today’s thoughts might not make much sense. I want to pick up where we left off yesterday… a young mom and her two year old, in the sandbox, sharing his toys with a group of older kids. I guess it would be more accurate to say, giving up his toys to a group of older kids. I hope you’ve given some thought to the principles at play here as well as the practical ways you might handle this situation. My guess is, if you’ve been parenting for any length of time, you’ve run into a similar situation with your own kids. Here are some things that I try to consider in these circumstances:

1. One of my standard teachings when we are group parenting is if everyone is parenting and paying attention to their own children, everyone gets along.
2. Generally, we want to teach our children that people are more important than things.  We value human relationships more than anything else.
3. We train our children to be servant leaders i.e. when there are younger, special needs, or senior citizens around, we expect them to be tuned into caring, honoring and serving them. They have grown up with the trigger: If it’s not fun for everyone, it’s not fun!!
4. This may be a wonderful opportunity to model good teaching. As a young mother I was always happy to step into those situations and speak in a happy, strong voice about how we were going to play together. Many are fearful of that today, but that seems to be even more of a reason to teach others how to gently, but confidently help others parent.
5. Phrases like,” OK, let’s all trade a toy with the next person” or I think he is asking for a turn with that toy” or “Everyone has 5 more minutes to play and then we will share it with someone who does not have something to play with”. Kids (and adults) are selfish by nature and us parents yearn for time at the park to relax while our children are happily playing. Sometimes we want a break and we are not tuned in to what is happening right in front of us. What amuses me is when the injustice is directed toward your child, all of a sudden, parents are back engaged!!

The reason that seemed to work is I was equally or harder on my own children with these principles so others could see I was about everyone having fun. And you know, in all those years, I can’t remember a parent getting mad at me for that!!

The big picture principle is this: Before we get irritated and frustrated with other parents, please hear their story! And yes, I know, you came to the park to have some fun, quality time with your children. But what if God, in His sovereignty, had something else in mind? What if, for such a time as this, He placed you there for that one parent or that child in the sandbox?

These are my favorite things to share about because when we stop and think, it is never as simple as, “I just wish people would manage their own kids in the sandbox”. Please don’t miss the walk in business in the sandbox or anywhere else life may lead you!!! Big Blessings….Kelli

Getting to the Root of Discipline!

I’ll never forget the first time I disciplined my daughter while visiting my mom and dad. Alyse, our oldest was being defiant and so I spanked her. She started to cry, so I sent her in back where she wouldn’t disturb everyone else. In my parents house there were two ways to the back room where we were staying. As I sent my daughter down one hallway, my mom was sneaking around through her room to meet and comfort her granddaughter. I remember thinking, “is this the same woman that used to blister my behind?” And now I am that grandparent… agonizing when my grandkids get disciplined… but grateful they have parents willing to “go there.”

In our enlightened 21^st century culture, discipline has become a bit controversial. In fact, some of you probably cringed when you read the word “spanked” above. Who knows, we maybe have lost some readers with this one revelation! But I’m getting ahead of myself. ‘Discipline’ of course has as its root word, “disciple”. So discipline can mean many things, but in some form or fashion it leads back to the idea of making a disciple- a follower of an idea or a person. I could spend the next three blogs talking about the importance of making sure you know what it is you want your child to become a follower of. Paul said it succinctly, “Follow me as I follow Christ”. Someday, your child will be an adult and he/she will decide what “discipline” to follow. Our job in the meantime is to put them on a path where they have a chance to see and experience truth and an opportunity to choose right. We always said, if our child ends up feeding pigs in the pig pen (Luke 15), we just didn’t want them to get there by accident. All we could ask of ourselves was to put them in position to say, I know what mom and dad believe and why, but I’m choosing to go a different way.

Of course the question becomes, what is the best method of discipline? And the honest answer is: it depends. What is the temperament of the child? What is the parent’s history and baggage? What is the offense? What is the context and situation? Of course, consistency is a must in parenting; so, how do we resolve, “it depends” with the need for constancy? This is why as parents, we need to spend much of our time on our knees seeking wisdom from God.  One of the first things I would suggest you ask of the Lord is for wisdom and discernment in evaluating what your child is doing. In other words, when something wrong happens, did it happen because your child was being “childish”… they didn’t know any better? Or did it happen because your kid knew exactly what they were doing, but defiantly chose to do it anyway. In many ways, this is one of the hardest skills in parenting. Sometimes its very easy… other times, it’s so hard to discern. If they’re being childish, we simply teach. But, if they are being defiant, then we need to discipline.

 

We’re not going to cover all the methods of disciplining, although in this series we’re going to talk about spanking and Kelli is going to share a few mommy tricks when it comes to disciplining in some future “Koffee With Kelli” posts. We mostly want to encourage you, especially if you are that mom or dad wondering if you’re going to mess your kids up if you punish or discipline them. No parent will handle this area perfectly, but we must still be willing to do it. It is unloving to “not” discipline your child. Years ago I read a parenting book by Zig Zigler. I don’t remember much of what he said, but one quote from his book that stuck with me is this:

“The child who has not been disciplined with love by his little world will be disciplined, generally without love, by the big world.”

The issue isn’t whether or not our kids will be disciplined… the only question is who will do the disciplining and in what manner will it be done. As imperfectly as we will parent, we know our heart and our motivation! And just to be clear: we aren’t talking about abuse or unhealthy punishment. Training self-discipline into our children is a loving act of a loving parent. To do otherwise, is abdicating our role as mom and dad. Sadly, as a coach over the years, I’ve had to be a first hand witness to countless athletes who never achieved even a portion of their potential because of a lack of self-discipline. I’m not passing judgment on those parents, often they are doing the best they can. But I am asking the question of the rest of us: do we love our kids enough to do the hard work of disciplining? Even when it’s unpopular? Even when it’s hard and inconvenient? Even if, at the time at least, our kids don’t like us? Enter into the fray… do your best. After that… rest in God’s grace.

“Discipline your son, and he will bring you peace; he will bring delight to your soul.” ~Psalm 29:17

Lessons From Our 242 Birthday Celebrations!

July 2^nd is the birthday of some very notable people; among them, Thurgood Marshall, Ron Silver and Jose Canseco. But in the Pritchard home, July 2^nd is Kelli’s birthday (and no, I won’t tell you which one it is!). I will tell you, since we’ve been married, combined with our children, we’ve celebrated 242 birthdays!!! Along the way, we’ve learned a few things and I’d like to pass some of them on to you.

• Life is a gift from God – ok not exactly earth shattering news, but as you reach each new milestone personally, you realize what a precious gift each day is. You also learn to never take another year for granted!
• People make the day special – I tried to think back to gifts I’ve been given over the years. It’s scary how few I can remember after having over 50 birthday parties! However, the relationships I’ve developed over those same 50+ years are what make life so sweet.
• Invite who you want to invite – this one might not affect most of you. But we learned early on, we had to give permission for people to invite whichever of our kids they wanted to. I think some were afraid if they invited one then they had to invite the lot! This isn’t a lesson specifically tied to birthdays, but it seems to be a lesson highlighted during birthday celebrations. What happens when someone gets invited to the party and someone else doesn’t? To avoid this today you aren’t even allowed to hand out birthday invitations at school. I know kids can be mean and we should do all we can to prevent that… but we’ve lost the ability to be happy for someone else unless we get the same thing. Parents have been known to take their child to the public amusement park where the party is being held because their kid wasn’t invited. We’ve tried to use birthdays and specifically celebrations to be another place where we teach our kids to be excited for the one receiving the blessing… especially if I’m not getting the same thing. It’s been a hard lesson at times for our kids.
• You are special – again not earth shattering, but we try to make sure the birthday boy/girl knows they are special. Little things during the day help… breakfast in bed if possible, we have a red plate that says, “I’m Special”, they get to pick their favorite meal for dinner, or we’ll try to do something as a family they want to do. Kelli loves getting her nails done and going for a walk.
• Say no to birthday wars – at the risk of sounding judgmental we chose to take ourselves out of any type of birthday competition. When our niece got picked up in a limousine, we knew from a practical sense if not a philosophical sense we were out. There is nothing wrong with extravagant birthdays and we feel blessed when one of our kids gets invited. We just had to practice what we preached… it wasn’t a competition and we would be happy for those who were able to do more than us.
• Words of affirmation – perhaps the most important thing we do takes place right after dinner (the one they chose!). Normally after dinner we go around and everyone shares one good thing from their day. On birthdays, we go around and everyone has to share something they love or appreciate about the birthday boy/girl. You might have to prep the younger ones… otherwise there can be a very awkward silence after you ask the question, “What do you love about Johnny?” This particular practice has become even more special as our kids have gotten older. Our adult children now Skype in to add their thoughts to the after dinner pronouncements.

Lastly may I take advantage of my audience and say how grateful I am for the person whose birthday we are celebrating in our home. She has been such an incredible partner and friend. I wish I could take her to Hawaii for her birthday, she deserves it. Instead I know she’ll love being reminded she’s a gift from God, special to us, and being affirmed by her family. By the way, the dinner she chose was Black Angus… of course it might be because we have a gift certificate! I can’t wait to hear all the affirmations her kids will have for her.

How to hold an effective family meeting… and why you’d want to

A football coach wouldn’t think of going through a season without holding regular team meetings. His players are busy, going in a hundred different directions. The coaches meet and have specific issues everyone needs to know. Team meetings allow coaches to cast vision, to give out awards, to give updates, to go over team rules, to explain changes, to take care of any team drama, and the list goes on.

Coaches wouldn’t consider a season

without “family” meetings!

Similarly we believe parents need to meet with their team on a regular basis. In our “team” meetings we pass on a vision for our family to the kids. It allows us to celebrate recent successes.  Remember, what gets celebrated gets repeated! We update the kids on the family calendar (especially as they get older and start having lives of their own). It also gives us an opportunity to address challenges we might be facing as a family or with disciplinary issues. We ask the question, “What kind of a family do we want to have?” It gives our kids a chance to speak into who we are.

But the most important reason for holding regular family meetings has nothing to do with disseminating information or teaching or correcting and everything to do with creating a sense of belonging. We know the great lure of gangs isn’t as much about drugs and money as it is about being a part of something, a family. In the same way, family meetings are one of the great tools we use to convey to our kids, “You are an important part of something special. You belong to this family and this family belongs to you!”

Family meetings help create a sense of

“belonging” in our family!

We’ve posted a Family Meeting worksheet on our Pritchard Ministries website. It explains some of the practical “how to’s” of conducting family meetings. We suggest when your kids are young to have them often and keep them short. We’ve been know on occasion (not often) to have our meeting over an ice cream cone at McDonalds. Sometimes Kelli will end a meeting with a treat. When our kids were young it was easy… we’d yell up the stairs and say, “family meeting in the living room… five minutes.” As our kids got older, they requested a little more notice. So now David texts the kids, “we’d like to have a family meeting Thursday night at 7pm. See you there unless I hear from you.” It takes some effort, but regardless of how many or how few children you have, family meetings can be an effective tool in your parenting journey. We’d love to hear stories from your family meetings!

Confessions of a Bad Parent

With the flood of movies from Iron Man to Man of Steel we decided to reprint a post we blogged a couple of years ago on our old site. I hope you enjoy.

After you read today’s post, you might never be willing to listen to us or read our blog again. I mentioned a few days ago about our midnight excursion to watch the premiere of The Dawn Treader. Some of you read that and questioned the wisdom of taking school age kids to a midnight movie on a school night. Don’t worry, it gets worse! Movies for our family have become a very special thing. First being in ministry it has always been a big deal to even be able to go to movies (and I’m one of those that HAS to eat popcorn at a movie!) and second somehow I’ve raised a family of movie buffs. You don’t want to get into a movie trivia game with Tavita or Jason – either about actors or movie lines. We’ve watched our share of really good movies like Remember the Titans and Hoosiers; but we’ve also watched our share of duds like the first Hulk. My kids know that after we watch a movie we will discuss the message sent or agenda pushed; we rarely watch without a little analyzing. That’s not to say we don’t enjoy being entertained, but I’m not one to pass up an opportunity for a teachable moment!

Often when I’m leading a group I’ll have them introduce themselves by sharing their “favorite”. For instance I might say, tell us your name, where you are from and your favorite ice cream. However my most often used “favorite” is movie. My personal answer has been the same for thirty years – Star Wars. I can sense that I already lost some of you with that revelation! Don’t worry it gets worse. I’m going to date myself, but I was in high school when Time magazine did a cover story about a new sci-fi motion picture that some were saying would be the movie of the year. It was 1977 and that movie of course was Star Wars – I was hooked. So you can forgive me (well maybe you can?) for my excitement when they finally decided to continue the saga by releasing the Phantom Menace (the fourth Star Wars installment and chapter one of the tale but that’s another story altogether). We were living in Centralia at the time and our local theatre would carry the movie on its release date. By the time the movie came out it had been the topic of conversation in our home many times. The decision was made to catch the first showing of the movie together as a family. I had waited sixteen years for this and I would get to share Luke Skywalker and Princess Leia with my kids! There was a problem. The premiere showing would be on a Wednesday at noon. With all of the national hype, it would undoubtedly be sold out. So here’s my confession – we pulled Krista from school to wait in line. That’s right, together with her friend (she was homeschooled) we dropped them off at the theatre with folding chairs at 7am to wait in line. Of course they weren’t even close to being first in line. The rest of us met her there later that morning (some of us had to be responsible and go to work!).

As it turned out the movie was awesome, but the experience was better.  As you know we wrote a book, Going Public, a couple of years ago. We are very supportive of teachers and education (we’ll blog about education another time). But I’ve often kidded; never let school get in the way of your child’s education. My kids still talk about that day. They can’t believe dad let them miss school to see a movie(I know some of you are thinking the same thing); and a sci-fi movie at that. I’m not sure what exactly  they missed that day in school (I do know they made up the work); but I’m sure we made a memory. We don’t do that type of thing very often, in fact almost never, or it would lose its impact. But we are known for seeking out opportunities to make a memory with our kids. As I finish writing this I’m also finishing my morning cup of coffee. And of course I’m drinking it in my favorite cup given to me by my kids – that’s right a Star Wars mug (pictured above)!

Koffee with Kelli

Good Morning Friends!!

Welcome to “Koffee with Kelli”, I guess that means coffee with me!!  I’d be so honored to have you join me each week; pour yourself a cup of coffee and let me share a short morsel about mothering and our families! My desire is for you to be encouraged and excited to be with your kids! Thank you for inviting me into your lives!!

Enjoying the summer with some of my kids!

After spring vacation  each school year we start counting “get up days”(the number of actual days that we have to get up for school) at our house. This accomplishes a number of things for our family: 1) it reminds us all to finish strong…if we are a little behind, we have time to step it up and finish well or if we are really on top of things, then just keep it up until school is out!! 2) It is a subtle way for me to tell the kids, “I am soooo excited that summer is near and I get you all to myself!!” I always say “I had you to be with you!!”  and 3)We all gear up for a change of pace…some down time…some margin from “get up, go to school, get ready for practice, eat dinner, make lunches, get your homework done, go to bed” kind of schedule!

I want our kids to know we are happy school is out!! Some are advocating for year round school and others do not look forward to kids being home because it creates problems logistically for the family. I understand there are valid reasons for both these thoughts.  But, I want my kids to remember I was as excited about summer as they were…yes…it does cause some problems…the house does not stay as clean, people want to eat all the time and boredom sets in quickly because kids are not used to entertaining themselves. But I still want them to know how fun it will be to have them home!!  So, how do we prepare for a season that has the potential to be very awesome or to unravel and ruin all that is wonderful about summertime?

A little Slip N’ Slide

Here are just a few thoughts from my 25 years of kids and summertime:

Celebrate the last day of school!!!  One year I picked everyone up with all the windows down blaring the song from High School Musical, “School’s Out”!! Go out to lunch, have a picnic, or surprise them with a special activity!

Have a family meeting right away with great treats. Kick off talking about how everyone wants the summer to go… technology privileges, chores, sleep, reading, field trips, jobs, money,  calendar of events, friends, school shopping, serving the community, workouts, devotions etc. Listen to everyone’s input and get excited about making it a great 11 weeks!

Give everyone a chance to do some research about what is going on locally that is inexpensive and fun. Here are some examples of what we’ve found over the years:

• We have taken a city bus field trip (yes with all 8 kids and the stroller and lunches).
• We’ve joined the local library’s summer reading program.
• Our community does free concerts in the park during the summer and they also have several festivals that are fun!!
• Lowe’s does a great woodworking project on selected Saturdays.
• Around the 4^th of July we do some teaching about America and the importance of knowing our country’s history. One of our favorite ways is to use Adventures in Odyssey.
• We plan for spontaneous (how’s that for an oxymoron) Smore’s nights
• We try to have our swim stuff ready in case we get invited to the lake.

This particular summer is unique for us. We need to do some catching up with our new children in the areas of reading and math facts. It is really interesting because they don’t want school to be over!! They love school!!  We encourage lifelong learning and lifelong reading in our family so we all try to keep our minds challenged. We have tried many ways through the years to tie technology privileges with reading time or other work I may have children do.

Also, I recognize many parents work through the summer and makes this conversation  different… the planning and managing of schedules changes. In that case, you get to maximize your evenings with them. Our church runs a great VBS program in the evening each summer. Kids can stay up a little later with parents without the pressure of a school day schedule.

We try to come up with a summer schedule that allows us to be flexible and fun but still gets the work done at home as well as the learning, the reading or the enrichment activities.

Some fun at the Seattle Center

Mostly, summer is a great time to let everyone change gears and enjoy family time, BBQ’s and the sound of kids laughing while they play on freshly cut grass!! Please invite your family into a great summer…it doesn’t always go exactly as you plan, sometimes it’s way better and other times we run into the unavoidable and have to adjust.

Send the message loud and clear to your kids ~ You are excited to have them home for the summer!