Life of the Rainers

Intentionality

Canon is now 19 months and I have been thinking a lot about "mothering" Canon.

One day recently I was getting ready for the day. Canon and I were meeting up for a play date to go to the Farmer's Market. I was blow drying my hair, putting my make up on, and trying to pick out clothes. While I was doing all of this Canon kept coming up to me and wanting me to go somewhere with him. I kept telling him, "I am trying to get ready Canon, it will have to wait". His persistence finally made me go with him. He took me to his room, picked up a book, and motioned me to sit down. The poor kid just wanted me to read to him. I sat down and read him a few books, only taking me 5 to 10 minutes. How many times do I blow Canon off because it is not convenient for me to stop what I am doing? I am not saying that every time he wants me to do something I have to stop what I am doing to make him happy. What I am saying is that day I started thinking about how many times I say to Canon - wait, not now, later, we don't have time for that, ect.

I want to be present in Canon's life as a stay at home mom. I don't want to just be around, I really want to be "present" in my children's lives. I am really trying to be conscious about sitting down with Canon and doing activities with him and having teachable moments with him. I don't want to miss opportunities to "teach" Canon because I am too busy keeping the house spotless, fixing the "perfect" dinner, or running around town too much. Again, there are things that need to be done and Canon does need to learn patience, but I want to be able to let the little things go and really be there with Canon.

Another area in thinking about "mothering" Canon is prayer. I have been thinking about that a lot lately too. My next blog post will be about this topic.

Here is Canon playing with ice while I was fixing that "perfect" dinner (not so much, but I was cooking). Thanks Erin Owen for the idea! It helps so much when I do need to get something done to give Canon an activity or a job. I can talk or sing to him while we are both busy doing our "activity".

Canon played with this bowl of ice for 45 minutes.

Rachel