Around the Web:

About that mom who’s not bragging about her kid

Nancy Wolf wrote this piece at the Washington Post last fall and I happened upon it again this past week. She encourages parents to hear what’s behind the words when another parent shares–or doesn’t share–about their kid’s successes.

• One Yiddish word I didn’t learn until I became a Mom is “kvelling” – when a person is bursting with pride and pleasure…When Lisa, Michelle and Denise’s kids were in elementary school, mine were of high school and college age. Kvelling gets a bit trickier as your kids get older. Especially if your kid happens not to be on the direct path from high school to early admission into Harvard, then on to elite grad school or Wall Street or a fancy internship.

  What happens to kvelling if your kid is on his or her own very different path?

  By the time one of my kids was in high school, we were on a first-name basis with mental health struggles. In college, the same mental health challenges grew worse. An elite grad school, Wall Street or a fancy internship did not seem likely. (Although hope does spring eternal.)

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A Conversation After School

Sarah Moudry shares some thoughts on how we help our young children process the experiences of their day.

• your child who is younger than five years old lives in the moment.  This means that when you come to pick him up from school, he is enjoying the moment of seeing you again and may be full of gratitude for that moment.  If in that moment, you ask, ” How was your day?” Or ” what did you do today?” he may be caught off guard and unable to answer your question. In his mind, he is enjoying the present and not recapping the day in his head.  The ability to recap the day is a function of the reasoning mind of an older child, not the absorbent mind of your young child.Next, children who feel compelled to answer their parents when asked, “Did you do any work today?” May feel unneeded pressure to perform.  If he doesn’t have an answer at that very moment he may come up with an activity he remembers, a person he recalls, or a staple answer that has seemed to work in the past: “Snack.”

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Around the Warren:

A Natural Imagination Boost

James Witmer challenges us to invite our children into our own hobbies–even those ones we think might be too “grown up”–for they may discover things we never realized were there.

• When I was about fourteen, friends of the family unexpectedly gifted me a week with a summer backpacking camp. We were to hike every day, sleep in tents, cook outdoors, and end miles from where we started.This was the first time my dad offered me his collection of hiking and backpacking books to read. I remember that most of them were engagingly, even humorously, written. I felt welcomed into a new world, where people argued good-naturedly about the merits of leather versus canvas boots.

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“…grace before I dip the pen in the ink.”

Paul Boekell’s artwork. G.K. Chesterton’s words. Not a bad combo.

Bil Lepp: Celebrated Liar and Children’s Book Author Answers A Few Questions

Sam Smith introduces his interview with Bil Lepp, author of The King of  Little Things, by saying:  

• My wife Gina wrote a short review of The King of Little Things and you can read that here. We love the book as a family and have snuggled up many times in our cozy home in West Virginia to read it. So imagine our surprise when we learned later that Bil Lepp, the author, was from just down the road? Lepp is a West Virginian, which makes him okay in our book, and his book is far from just okay. Bil is a storyteller and the five-time champion of the West Virginia Liars Contest. But we speak the truth when we say that our family loves the book and we commend it to you.

Read the interview.

When Early March Seems Middle May

Something to Do with Your Kids:

Speaking of springtime, here are six ways to make flowers! Try them out with your family and see which you enjoy most.

And Something to Watch

You may have considered beekeeping once. You may actually keep bees. But most of us, I’d wager, get our honey at the grocery store. If you do, you may not have considered how the honey gets from the hive to your toast.

Thank you for reading. We’re on your side.