A couple months ago, Jill's friend, Jenn, did a post about playing with her kids. About how it can be really hard and sometimes isn't any fun. Playing dolls, transformers, legos, whatever. I find that even when I do sit down and play, which is way too infrequent, I am thinking about all of the other things I need to do. My mind wanders. It's so unfair to my kids and it makes me feel like I am not a very good mom. Why is it hard? I think I don't have enough kid in me. For some reason, I enjoy playing games with my kids the most. I think it gives direction and I don't have to use imagination which is a lot of effort. I am working on this.
I recently noticed that I was always saying, "In just a minute" or "I can't do that right now...". But I don't want to send the message to my kids that they aren't important to me. I realized that most of the time the things I was doing could wait, such as cleaning up the kitchen, doing laundry, making beds, etc. I'm trying to not only come to my children when they want me to play with them, but also be the one to initiate the play. Isn't this a great way to show your child you love them? By saying, "You are so important to me, that I want nothing more than to play with you right now."
So today Olivia said, "Mom, want to play with me?" Just this sweet question alone kills me. How can I say no? I resisted the urge to tell her all of the things I needed to do. (Ok, I admit I did check the clock to make sure we had enough time before we had to leave at 10:30, then I sat down.) I think the poor girl was surprised because she didn't even have to ask again.
We played tea party with her Cinderella tea set, which Nana gave her for Christmas. (Thanks Mom, she loves it.) It was funny because she said, "I'm the mom and you're the girl." Usually this means I have to listen to lots of commands and get chastised alot. Isn't it interesting the things your kids say when they are pretending to be you? Does it scare you? With Olivia, it usually includes, "You're going to get a spank" or "Go to time out" because that's what she hears alot, unfortunately. Today it included "No, you can't eat that. It's for school lunch." I have to tell her this when she wants to eat all those expensive pre-packaged items in the cupboard. I am glad though, that I get to hear these things because it makes me more conscious about the type of mother I am. Did you ever see that Oprah where they showed footage to the mean moms of the way they talk to their kids? I couldn't believe that some of the mothers swore at their kids and called them really ugly names. I admit I get short tempered, but I think "I'm going to spank your bum and it will hurt" is about as bad as it gets... though I guess I could choose something a bit less violent!
Do you find it hard to play with your kids? What kinds of things do you find yourself doing most often? What are your favorite activities to do together? What do you think is the best thing to say when you really don't have time to sit and play and your child gets upset about it?
4 comments:
I do find it difficult to play imaginary play. I do it occationally, but usually I just leave that up to my girls to do together, which they do beautifully. The things I usually do with them are color, playdoh, dancing, books, games...things of this nature. I can do these activites and really enjoy being with them instead of thinking, "when it will be over".
When my kids ask me to play or do anything for that matter I try to give them a positive answer like, "I would love to play with you as soon as the kitchen is cleaned up". Giving them a positive response makes all the difference in the world. I use this technique with everything and it works beautifully. One time they asked to go outside and play and first I said, "not until your room is clean". I noticed I wasn't getting the response I wanted so immediatly (10 seconds later) I rephrased my words to, "feel free to go outside as soon as your room is clean." No joke, they went right to their rooms and cleaned so they could go play. You should try this sometime as it has really done wonders in my home. Not as much complaining because I have given them the ok. Now its up to them to decided how badly they want to play.
Imaginary play is hard for me, but I make the effort so she can be developing those skills. I love doing the hands on things like reading, playdough, painting, chalking, playing in the sprinkler, going to the park. When I am doing dishes or something, I usually have her bring her tea set in the kitchen (she has almost the same one as you guys) and will take little breaks to have the tea party. It makes the dishes take a lot longer, but I know it is important to her. Usually after about 15 minutes she is sick of me and starts to play with something else in her room.
I really like Amy's solution...I'll have to remember the whole positive answer thing when she is a little older.
I'm really bad about actually playing with the kids...I just hate it. It's nice now that they're older and don't do as much imaginary playing. I can play Uno Attack with them or kick the soccer ball with them or blow bubbles or dance in the kitchen, stuff like that. Whitney is really good about telling me what she needs and will come and say, "Mom, let's hang out on your bed and read books, kiss, hug, and squeeze." How can I resist that? Landon is more difficult because he's so independent and I'm not sure what he wants from me. It was nice while we were homeschooling because I was sitting next to him at the computer for a couple hours a day. I need to work harder to make sure he's getting what he needs from me.
My kids are still little, so we play legos, play dough, etc. When I scrapbook, they get out their coloring stuff and I let them use my old stamps.
One of the funnest things we did was to make a movie. I brought all of their old Halloween costumes from the attic. They helped decide the story, dressed up, and I just started filming with my digital camera. We downloaded it onto the computer. The movie only ended up being 5 minutes long, but they watched it over and over for an hour. They were so proud of themselves.
Anyway, there's an idea for a mess-free activity that was really fun.
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