Welcome back! I hope you had an amazing Thanksgiving holiday! If you ate even a portion of the food I consumed over the weekend then you too are wondering how in the world you will ever fit into your normal pants again to go back to work tomorrow! It’s been so nice to wear elastic waist sweat pants all weekend so I could avoid the reality of facing the zipper on my jeans…darn those last few pieces of pie…
I had a great weekend spending time with my family and hosting many of my extended family for the long weekend . We had so much fun playing games together and stepping away from our cell phones to focus on each other. That is definitely something we need to do more often because the memories we make spending time really focused on one another laughing and talking are priceless.
Watching my grandbaby Flynn over these last few days was magic. He is around 14 months now so he is running around and saying words and mimicking just about anything and everything we do. It’s as if his little brain is a sponge that literally soaks up everything he sees us do and then he tries to imitate it. He watches us open a door and then he goes and opens it to. He watches us open a bottle and he tries to open it to. He hears us say words and he tries to say them to. Everything he sees or hears is teaching him how to move, how to talk, how to express emotions, etc.
As I sat watching him I thought to myself how much more aware we need to be of the fact that he is watching everything we do and he is learning how to act from the examples we are setting. I realized e cannot let ourselves underestimate the impact our example has on children.
“Children are great imitators so give them something great to imitate.” – unknown
I know that I am who I am because I watched my father and mother and older siblings examples and I tried to replicate them. Our children and grandchildren are going to be who they are because they watched our examples and tried to replicate them. Which is exactly why we all need to be more mindful of how we are acting day to day. We just never know when a child is watching and learning from us. Give them something great to imitate.
Have a wonderful Monday back everyone!
~Amy Rees Anderson
