Nathan and I went to a seminar at our church this morning, called Boys Alive. It was a really great talk, and I may write more about it later. One of the things the speaker talked about is the importance for boys to contribute or feel like providers. Elias already feeds the cats, sets the table at meals, and cleans up his toys every day so I thought we were doing pretty good. But we could probably do a lot better. Letting Elias (and eventually Simon) feel power and importance and making contributions takes time and patience. These are things I’m not always easily willing to give.
This evening after dinner, I wanted to get everything cleaned up as quickly as possible so that we could move on with the rest of our evening. Elias kept asking me to play with him, and I kept telling him that no I could not play, I was doing chores. He needed to go play. When I plopped the dishwasher door open so that I could unload it before reloading the dirty dishes, Elias stated, “I will help you!” I wanted to badly to just say, “No, go play!” I could have done it so much faster. But instead I let him help. He handed me each dish, one at a time, and he loved it.
Only a few dishes in, Simon came crawling into the kitchen and “helped” as well. Nathan happened upon the scene, and snapped a few pictures because even he had to admit it was cute.
We got the dishwasher unloaded, and reloaded, and we moved on with our evening. It was worth the couple extra minutes for sure!
Here are my little helpers:
You two are such model parents! It is such a gift to watch you with Elias and Simon.