Halloween 2009
My daughter is learning to read, so numerous times throughout the day we phonetically pronounce letters and their sounds. The word PROUD definitely starts with a P.
And, I look at this Halloween photo and proud is what comes to mind. It’s not a fancy staged family photo – it’s not even all that great – but, it speaks volumes about my kids and the kind of people they are becoming. People I am very proud to know.
My son (9-years old) decided one day that he’d spontaneously help my husband stack wood for our winter fires. He worked all afternoon with his dad. No complaints. No giving up. Somewhere during the day he decided he’d start weeding the foundation of our house, too. Now don’t get me wrong, we do these things in our house called “family helps” and each kid gets $2 a week (one of which goes in the bank) for completing their family helps with us, so he knows the concept of getting paid for work. But the thing that impressed me about the wood stacking and weeding is that he just did it with no mention of it being a family help.
Later, when discussing his Halloween costume choice and the fact that it was too expensive, he was crushed. However, we gave him three options.
1.) Re-use his costume from last year (which still fit) and we’d give him $10 for his unselfish help with stacking the wood.
2.) Purchase a new, cheaper costume (we gave him a dollar limit) and keep his $10 woodstacking money.
3.) Put his $10 toward the more expensive costume he wanted and forgo any cash in his wallet.
He chose #3 and he’s happy and proud with his work with his dad and his costume decision. We heard no grumbling, no whining, and no trying to get things to all turn out in his favor with the new costume and the money ending up in his pocket. He made his choice and we supported him.
Now my daughter (5-years old) chose a different route. She was – from the very first time the topic of Halloween costumes was discussed for the year – going to be Padmé Amidala for the second straight year. It didn’t matter what we said, she wouldn’t budge. She also decided at some point, that Padmé wore a blue sparkly head wrap so she would, too. Now to the best of my knowledge, Padmé never wore a head wrap but since my daughter wanted to wear one, she insisted that Padmé had, indeed, worn a head wrap. We rolled with it and she was happy as a clam in her old costume with her added accessories.
Both kids are confident in their own ways, happy with their decisions and having fun. Again, PROUD starts with a P comes to mind.
