Gratitude

It’s hard to believe that the holidays are right around the corner already.   With Thanksgiving coming up, and so many people falling on hard times, we really want to help the girls to understand what it means to be thankful.  It’s fun to be spoiled with presents, but we never want them to lose their gratitude for what they’re given, and it’s never too young to learn. 

 

A couple of weeks ago Eva found a toy catalog.  She flipped through a few pages, pointed to a toy she wanted and said, “Daddy, you buy me that!”  Awhile later I took the girls shopping with me, and they kept asking for things that caught their eye.   They had started to develop a little entitlement attitude.   A normal stage of childhood, but one that has to be nipped in the bud before it gets out of hand.

 

It’s a normal life lesson that every one of us has to learn eventually:  you can’t always get what you want.   So now we’re making an effort to remind the girls to be thankful for what they have.   I continue to take them shopping with me so that they once again get used to the fact that most shopping trips don’t involve buying a new trinket.  I had Eva help me pick out toys to donate to Goodwill.   We remind them to say “Please” and “Thank you” when they want or receive something, and we’re trying to scale presents back to special occasions, like birthdays and holidays. 

 

This Christmas, with Dave being out of work, we’ll be trying to keep things simple, anyway.  This year we plan to just get one present for the both of them: a small toy kitchen they can use indoors when the weather is too cold for them to use the playhouse.  They’ll love playing on it with the toy dishes Grandma Geri sent them.