It's just been recently that my children have begun to flex their muscles in the art of sibling rivalry, a skill which I am sure will serve them for the rest of their lives.
Bentley, with his advanced language and motor skills, takes great joy in pointing out things that he can do that Kendra cannot because, "she's just a little baby still." Kendra actually has a pretty good little vocabulary for her age, but even she can't manage to counter this long argument yet. Give her time.
Both children, however, have discovered the phrase, "ME FIRST!" and they yell this whenever I need to do anything for both of them at the same time. This includes story time before naps, giving them their lunches, cleaning them up after said lunches have been consumed, etc.
But the thing they really get competitive over is praying. They are both frantic to get to bless the food. So we've been saying two prayers before each meal. I'd love to say that we're just so darn righteous and spiritual and whatnot, but in all honesty I'm usually pretty hungry by the time I've cooked dinner, and I hate eating food that has cooled down, so I'm all for digging in pretty quickly. Doesn't two prayers before each meal seems just a tad excessive? And now, sometimes those two prayers aren't even enough, and both children will continuing "praying" while we're eating. By this time my mouth is full and I'm done helping out, so they get to say their own prayers without any help from Mommy (or Daddy, who feels the same way). This usually consists of, "Father, Jesus, Amen." Which they repeat, yelling, with the most smug smiles on their faces.
I guess it's a start, but I doubt God is too impressed by it all.
4 comments:
Naw, I would think he's incredibly impressed. Think of all the families that don't pray together. And your kids actually like it. Aidan is HORRIBLE every night prayer and Brian only recently started liking to say prayers.
To each their own. Afton just likes the folding arm bit, I don't even think she's interested in the prayer part yet.
Hmm, that's weird - I don't know how they learned sibling rivalry. It certainly wasn't from you because there was never any rivalry at all between any of us when we were growing up. Right?
I love this post!
Jeff was reading this over my shoulder when we were at the library (utilizing internet and everything). Then a few nights later, when I was reading scriptures and it was his turn to pray (we switch off), he totally tried to get away with "Father, Jesus, Amen", the end. I just about died laughing.
Too bad it was only because he was sleepy and because he was a competitive toddler (your kids have an excuse!) :)
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