A few mornings ago, as we stepped outside in the chill of the early morning air, my six-year-old son stopped in his tracks and said—
“Smell that! Take a deep breath.”
“It’s so fresh,” his brother followed up.
And my heart stretched a little on both sides. 🙂
Maybe my subtle efforts to live mindfully with my kids were rubbing off on them after all. Most of the time, my efforts end in someone squishing a bug or pulling out an imaginary weapon.
But I’m stubborn enough to keep at it, because I believe that awareness is key to contentment, and I want my children to grow into adults who notice the color of the sky as they drive home from work and more importantly, notice the stirrings within their souls as they rock their own babies to sleep.
But for now, we’ve got sunsets to watch, bugs to squish, and teddy bears to squeeze tight to our chests.
Practicing mindfulness with your kids doesn’t need to be elaborate; it’s not something you have to schedule into your days. It can be as simple as listening to the birds on your walk to school or asking your kids how a song on the radio makes them feel.
You guys—I’m really excited about this post, and I hope you’ll join me at Kids Stuff World for 10 (fun!) mindfulness exercises you can do with your kiddos! Thanks so much for following me over there!
(Hi Erica, I tried posting this on the site but got an error)
Erica, what a fantastic post. I especially love the tip about placing the stuffed animal on their bellies to watch it rise and fall. I’m going to try that with my kiddos tomorrow. My kiddo has said similar things about noticing the small beauties of the present moment, like pointing out what a nice day it is, or how green the grass is. I think it’s totally us rubbing off on them since I do this all the time with them haha.
No problem, Nina! It was sweet of you to come back here and repost! Your kids sound like mine. Nothing makes me happier than when I hear one of our boys say, “It’s a beautiful day to be alive!”
And I’m intrigued by your 12 crafty ideas for non crafty moms. Sounds like me! Off to check it out!
Hey there! Random request for content for you, I vaguely remember you refinished/painted your piano forever ago, but I can’t remember where the pictures are! 🙂 Would you mind giving us a little tutorial on how you did it? Whether you still like it, etc? I’m considering doing the same thing. 😉 Thanks!!
Hey lady! So here are the posts I’ve shared on our painted piano:
https://ericalayne.co/2012/03/craigslist-piano-makeover.html
https://ericalayne.co/2013/05/painted-pianos-2.html
I think painting a piano is a great way to give an old, hopefully inexpensive piano new life! I really loved ours. (Sadly, I rarely made the time to play it so we decided to give it to someone in our building before we moved.)
A few more random thoughts: I painted ours in a matt finish because I wanted to make sure it didn’t look like I was trying to turn it into a high-end glassy piano. (which it clearly wasn’t. 🙂 I also did a bit of distressing to it, which I’m glad I did, because with little kids running around, it got some more scratches, but they just fit right it! 🙂
As for how I actually did it. I just taped off the keys like crazy, sanded and painted!
Good luck!!!
Thanks for the article!
My brother has a nice little 2 year old daughter. I have recently started an MBSR course, but it seems my brother and his family could also use some techniques from mindfulness even if Ann is only 2 🙂