School is fast upon us. The summer is coming to a close. We have all been to Wal-Mart or Staples to buy new crayons, pencils, erasers, and scissors. All necessities on everyone class room shopping lists. I even bought a few items not on the list because I wanted them to feel like they had everything they possible needed to do well at school. This is all followed by a trip to the mall, new jeans, new shirt and shoes. Even a haircut all things so they can look the part and put their best foot forward on the new school year. This process caused me to ask myself a few questions…

What have I done to prepare my kids emotionally or spiritually for this coming school year? A great book by Gary Smalley, The Keys to Your Child’s Heart, shares a few ideas starting on page 59.

Expressing Loving Support-The Most Important Aspect of Raising Children

• Unconditional Commitment
• Scheduled Times

This list brought a flood of memories back to the front of my memory. I would like to look at a few of these today. My mom was one of the heroes of MY high school track team.  I was far from being one of the best athletes on out track team. I was a thrower. I threw the shot put and the javelin, occasionally coming in third place at a local meet. Many times the two that beat me were from my own team. My mom was a star; she never missed a meet and always came with homemade cookies. My teammates would go and visit with her and eat some fresh baked cookies, they loved to see my mom by the fence watching our meets. She came to watch me and to meet my friends. I look back now and this was only one of the ways that my mom communicated an unconditional commitment to me. School provides many opportunities to volunteer and show our kids that we are willing to make them a priority and even meet some of their friends. It could be anything from sitting down and helping with homework or volunteering to help in your child’s class. Tell your child’s teacher what you love and brainstorm on a way that it could be beneficial to the class.

Time is a commodity that everyone seams to be a little short of. Your children starting school places a new time restraint on them and this can bring out stress.  My boys love to go to grandma’s house because she seems to always have time. I think the key is that she is great at capitalizing on the time she has. She had the boys help make homemade pizza. The boys had a great time and work was accomplished without them even realizing that they had been a help. I showed up right a dinner time and also enjoyed the fruit of their labor. It was great to see them enjoy this experience so much. Scheduled times can feel forced or they can show our true priorities. Some ideas may include creating a favorite meal or dessert. They might include a meal around the dining room table with funny questions about work and school. The times don’t need to be long; they just need to be meaningful. It might surprise you what your kids get most excited about. Mine love homemade pizza followed by the movie Pizza My Heart. Give it a try, you might find that you enjoy these times as much as your kids do.

Many of my great ideas have come on accident, most of the ideas that have worked well in my family were other people’s accidents that I was able to do on purpose. Do you have any thought that might help others looking for a great idea to do on purpose?