Deanna Rabe

One of the lessons that I learned over my 28 years of parenting was about being intentional.  By this I mean that I deliberately made choices in how I would parent the kids God gave to us.  I came to realize that my kids would not learn manners, or math without me having a plan and doing it.  Having a plan may sound like more than you want to think about this summer, but it can be very simple. As I may have mentioned a time or two, I don't like things that require prep work.  I want to open a book and get to the science, I don't want to have to pre-read a lesson. The same is true in my being intentional - I want it to be purposeful but easy.  So I chose a book, a movie, an activity, or just time together with my kids where we could focus on a character trait, or other kind of subject, and then talk about it afterward. If you want your kids to be kind, then you have to model that and talk to them about being kind, and how to handle it when other people aren't