Family Meetings

When I taught parenting classes there was always a session on family meetings.
I never tried them, started them but lost focus as we adjusted to the taking in the girls.
 Tonight we held a family meeting. My older daughter took the notes,
the youngers made desert. We are going to hold them bi-weekly.  Any one can add an agenda item. The agenda will be on the refrigerator.

This week we talked about starting allowances, as suggested by Kevin Lehman, the rules and expectations of an allowance. We established a new cleaning process, with each child taking ownership of a public area in the house and our plans for Fall Break.  Everyone gave input and the first meeting with the new family went well :)

Here is how ours flowed:

Meeting called
Compliments
Agenda Items discussed and decisions made
Opportunity to share and get support or ideas.
Allowances handed out
Desert.
Meeting ajourned.

After the little ones went to bed, it sure was nice to enjoy a movie with the older children. We went to the library and found a nice selection of dvd's, as well as books and magazines to enjoy this week. I love how excited the kids get when they find their treasure of a new book or a movie.  Its been another nice weekend.
If you hold family meetings, I'd love to here your ideas. If you haven't try one, keep the first few short, positive and simple before you tackle more sensitive topics. 

August 28, 2010

The novelty and energy of returning to work after the summer has worn off..I'm tired!  We are enjoying a quite day at home. I just finished playing a homemade game of sight word war with Sadie. The laundry is going and the rest of the house is quite.  We had a busy morning of dress up and painting. I'm enjoying the quite hour.   I treated myself to a new point and shoot camera. I can't wait to try it out. I think we are going to get the little girls all princessed out and do a pretend photo shoot.   What are you up too?

Fire Drill

I am pondering why some weekends have more then enough time and others are too short? This was one of those weekends where we got the chores done and played.  We had a fire drill today. I try to do them one a season. I put up paper fire so they have to find different ways out of the house and meet at our meeting spot in the neighbors yard.  I'm glad we pratice. The first time I did one, everyone ignored the fire alarm. Now they grab a little one and head out to our meeting spot.

The girls are finishing up a movie on Jesus, how could I call bedtime on that. Time for a story, devotion and bed.

8/21/10

What a great day, today just seemed to be nicely balanced. Wish they all felt like this, typically I feel behind. Its still 108 here in the desert, so a great deal of our play time was in the pool. This evening I was inspired to hear Dave Ramsey, the financial guru speak at church. Then being that it was only 100 outside the girls road bikes and helped as they were able to do the front yard work. A surprise gift to their big brother, who typically takes care of the landscape.  The kids are tucked in, time for some me time! I'm looking forward to making halloween bows for the girls. Tonight I have just enough energy to make the spiral ribbons. If you want to learn to make your own boutique bows, check out UTube videos to get you started.

Beginnings

I've never done a Blog, but everyone says I should write a book about our family, I'm not sure we are that interesting or unique so we'll keep this book to a Blog.  Lets start with introductions: I'm DeAnn, I'm a christian mom who works during the day as an elementary school counselor. At home I take care of my family:  Brendan 14yrs, Teagan 9yrs, Trinity 6yrs, Sadie 6yrs, Lexi 3yrs and Chloe 2yrs. Currently we are in the process of blending two families into one as we adopt the last three girls. They came to us as a temporary foster care placement, staying an estimated 3 days that was over two years ago. You'll note I often refer to us as we, as it takes God and the kids efforts to be a successful single parent home.  I hope this Blog becomes an  inspiration and useful to mom's everywhere who raise children.