
Janelle and kids getting ready for church (isn’t Edision a great helper?)
Little kids are SO sweet and fun. But being the mother of small children with unpredictable needs and behavior can sometimes drive you to the brink! No matter how well you plan things out, things seldom turn out the way you might like.
In this episode, Saren (mother of five children ages 10-15) and Janelle (mother of 5 children ages 1-7) share three concrete (and totally do-able) ideas for dealing with the hard stuff that comes with having small children who are close in age.
Show Notes
Learning Circles (program to help you set up a monthly gathering of moms in your community)
Janelle’s Blog: Where are my Mary Janes?
Music from Creations by Michael R. Hicks
Audio Editing by Christy Elder
I couldn’t find an address to email the power of mom founders Saren and April and all those who work with them directly, so I will just write the comment here:). This is a long overdue THANK YOU that I must share. I have been familiar with Power of Moms website for about a year and a half now. It was such a blessing when I saw an article that a friend of mine posted on Facebook from your site. I clicked the link to your page and it forever opened a world of motherhood gems to me. 🙂 Seriously. I just noticed a quote on the top of your page about the mom told her friend something like… anything she was looking for mothering tips, tricks or just a good boost etc could be found here. I agree, and have found this to be such a fantastic resource to help me in raising my two little girls.
I want to share an interesting experience I had the other day: Recently I typed up a three page ‘motherhood interview’ of very thought out questions to ask both of my grandmas, my mom, and my mother in law. I got the opportunity to interview one of my grandmas just this last weekend- who by the way is absolute GOLD in my eyes. Her answers were so inspiring and insightful for me, but also not too surprising because knowing who she is now, I could only imagine she was a fantastic mother as well. One answer however I was a little bit surprised by. I asked the question “What were some of the challenges of your day with motherhood and what do you think some of the greatest challenges myself and mothers face today in raising our children.” She gave me most of the answers I expected when it came to our day and the challenges we face. Things that are much more prevalent now such as; pornography and media influences (BIG BIG one), drugs, entitlement, etc. But then the part that surprised me a bit was to hear such a faith filled woman honestly say, “I don’t know if I could have done it. I don’t know that I could raise kids in this day and age.” Of course I knew she could, but It got me thinking. It IS a hard time to raise kids, but to counteract that downright hardness and the power of harsh influences, we have been given SOOOO many incredible resources to help us along the way!!!! I probably wouldn’t think I could do it either if it were not for all of the incredible valuable tools we have been given. This is one of those resources for me! It has been such a help in so many areas. Not only are your articles wonderful, but the links to different products or books that you have found helpful are wonderful. I want to THANK YOU all for all of the work and effort you put into this! Also I want to reassure you all of what a strength you have been to me and I am sure MANY MANY MANY other mothers!!! Good things just can’t help but be shared and this is something I am ALWAYS telling friends about.:) THANK YOU, THANK YOU for following your hearts!!!!
Jenny:
Thanks for sharing the great story about your interviews (I’ve got to do the same – great idea!). SO MUCH for your thoughtful comment and kind words. Sometimes it can be so hard keeping up with the demands of this website while being the deliberate mother, wife, and friend that I want and need to be. But inevitably, when I start to feel overwhelmed and somewhat discouraged, a comment like your comes my way. Thanks so much for expressing your thanks and helping me get a further glimpse of how much Power of Moms is doing for so many. We’ve got a board of volunteers who work tirelessly to help me and April keep the great resources coming at Power of Moms and I’m going to forward this wonderful comment to them.
Thanks for being part of this community and for taking the time out of your doubtless very busy life to express your thanks. Please keep spreading the word about all that we offer here. Our greatest goal is to help moms have the resources they need to be the moms they want to be.
And you’re so right – while mothering is harder these days than ever in some ways and the Internet offers plenty of difficult and bad things, the Internet also offers such powerful opportunities to learn from each other as deliberate mothers. Long ago, we could only learn from those few mothers who we could interact with in person. Now we can learn from SO many great moms all around the world and that is such a huge blessing!
Oh, and Jenny, I’d sure love to see a list of the questions you came up with to ask your mom and grandmas and mother-in-law. You can email me directly at saren (at) powerofmoms (dot) com.
I’d love to see Jenny’s questions as well! I just lost my grandmother and don’t want to waste another moment in learning all I can from the special people in my life who are still living. I think the world of my mother, and am always in awe of the patience she is able to show my two young boys. I’d love to see the types of questions Jenny came up with as a jumping off point for my own inspirational interviews. 🙂
Beth Pulito
bethpulito (at) gmail