Carie Moore is the District 4 representative on the NDFB P&E Committee. Her blog posts will be featured each Thursday.
Routine brings balance
By Carie Moore
I'm a mom. A wife. A farmer. A full-time employee. A volunteer. Sound familiar?
I don't make resolutions, but I do work on making changes, and changes don't work if they're not practical or not the right fit for you. That's why so many fail. They use expectations of others, or expectations that work for someone else, or just unreal expectations of themselves.
I recently came across a statement that I want to apply to my life in 2018. "I don't want to be busy...I want to be productive."
Like most parents, I’m busy. But are we productive? Is the goal in what we're so busy with producing something positive? I could have my kids in sports on top of everything else but for our family, is it something that will stress or bless?
Is me running to and from one more thing, leaving less time at night for family and homework, organizing schedules when I'm away or we're in the field, going to be beneficial to anyone in our family? No. So, when something comes up we weigh all the angles.
First, do we or they WANT to do it, and I mean REALLY want to do it, not just kinda or maybe. Second, do they NEED to do it. For us that's church activities and 4-H. If those answers are yes, we take it from there. No point in discussing if there is no need or want.
You learn tricks along the way as a parent. For me, clothes are out, bags are packed and by the door, meal is prepped in my lunch bag or the whole week’s ingredients to take to work Monday morning are packed in a bag the night before.
I have found that my kids need routine. I need routine. You can't set expectations for kids and expect them to followthose expectations if they are always changing. That's why chores and routine are important to us.
We aren't just raising kids, we're raising someone who eventually may raise kids. Routine is a gift we can give our children that will last a lifetime.
(To learn more about how kids can be a part of what's cooking, check out The Family Table: Invite Kids Into the Kitchen.)