Blanket Training

Today I started working on blanket training my smallest. I had a lot to do this morning and keeping her out of trouble wasn't something I wanted to spend a lot of time on. More produce is coming in tomorrow instead of Friday and I realized that there are several things from last week that we've not used up so I needed to freeze those things (green peppers, broccoli and squash) and I also needed to start some chicken in the crock pot for tonight (called cream cheese chicken, I've never had it, I hope it's good). Getting my cooking out of the way earlier has become a goal of mine lately, but that's another topic.

What is blanket training? Well, it's just teaching them to sit and play on a blanket you've put on the floor until you've allowed them to get off. I did this with the previous baby a little earlier than this. I didn't use it extensively but it was useful at times. And now is the time I need it for this one. Right now she's always into cabinets and all sorts of things she ought not be in. A play pen would be an option, yes, but either she'd have to be back in my room where the pack-n-play is set up, thus attracting the other little lady in there (and she'll just get into all my stuff and she's much more creative about getting into things) or I'd have to haul the pack-n-play in and out of the room which is a pain. And it's easier to take the blanket outside, to someone else's house, etc. While blanket training takes time, it's easier in the long run. AND a good practice in obeying mommy.

It's not overly difficult. Especially now, as she understands the gist of what I'm saying when I tell her to stay on the blanket. As soon as she gets off, I put her back on making sure not to let her have her way in wandering off. If you let them wander off they'll never stay on when you want them to. I started off with about 10-15 mintues this morning. I gave her some kitchen things to play with. Her big sister decided to join her. (Really mom, her hair is like that for security reasons! No one will be able to identify her! Same for the spoon.)

Teaching Kids to Give

One thing that inspires me as a mother is knowing that I could be taking part in laying the ground work for a person (one of my children) who will serve God in a great way some day. It's my hope and prayer that God will use my children; one, some or all of them, to reach many. With this in mind, it's important to me to make sure my children learn to think of the needs of others. When they get something, I want them to be thinking about passing the blessing on, not just hoarding it to themselves. I want this to be my attitude, too. And that goes for anything. Toys, money, food, a godly heritage...

So, just how do you do this? Well, lately we've had the opportunity to take part in a new organization (http://elpisinternational.org/) that my brother-in-law and his wife have helped to bring together. An Ethiopian congregation meets at their church and the pastor is originally from Ethiopia. He and his brother (who lives in Ethiopia) started a feeding center for children there. I gather that a couple times a year, this pastor flies back to Ethiopia with funds for his brother to feed children who have no parents or with only one parent. This past year, my brother-in-law flew over to Ethiopia and visited and since coming back they've been working on getting this organization together so that people can sponsor kids. Hopefully this will grow and they will be able to feed and teach more. We've had the opportunity to sponsor one of the children who is just the age of one of mine. We have his picture above our kitchen sink and pray for him, too. Since this is small scale right now, we have been able to send a Christmas package with a group from the church who are going over there. While we've done the Christmas shoeboxes for several years, this is so much more real to the boys because they have a face and a real story of the person who is getting this. Talking about it and having them take part in getting things for him has been really great. Today we grabbed lunch at a fast food place and several of the kids chose to save their kids meal toy for sending in the future (some of these will have to go in the Samaritans Purse shoe boxes)! How awesome is that?! It's a little thing but that's where this stuff starts!!