motherhood art and posts for encouragment

I keep a list of my favorite mothering blog posts in my task list: posts that remind me to slow down; posts that refocus my child-training efforts; words that encourage me to stay present and keep climbing.  I set this list to pop up once a month in my to do list app, so that these moments of clarity don't get buried under all the laundry and whining.  Today, I'm sharing a few links from my list with you all.

This weekend I came across this amazing artist Katie Berggren and I couldn't help but include a few of her sweet paintings as well.  Her originals are a little spendy for anyone who actually has children (aka mini-destroyers) in their home, but Berggren sells prints on her blog and in her Etsy shop that are less likely to cause heart failure if someone slings peanut butter across the room.  (No, I'm not her salesperson.  I just fell in love with her work!)

Ava, Wyatt, and Charlotte??  by K.M. Bergreen via Etsy

by K.M. Berggren via Painting Motherhood

By K.M. Berggren via Etsy

Romancing the Hearts of Our Children for Christ

Motherhood is unscripted and sometimes not at all harmonic. You are dealing with your own selfish flesh as well as the little ones around you. We live in a fallen world.  In order for perfect harmony to take place in the imperfect family we must know our place before Christ, clothe ourselves in His perfection and work together as one. At that time, the romance can begin. We romance the hearts of our children for the cause of Christ.

Six Strategies for Sibling Rivalry

The trouble with parenting advice is the expectation that things are going to go perfectly right when you implement it. After all, when you look up why your car is running poorly, you don’t want someone to tell you something like, “Do these things, pay this money, put up with the noise, and in a few years things will look up.”  Can you imagine that? Of course not. . . God will give you the grace. I’ll give you my six ideas for avoiding sibling rivalry — as long as you understand that nothing is perfect in this world. Jacki, your husband is right — some sibling rivalry is part of growing up. Especially a girl and boy are not going to get along well — not the way we moms want them to — and maybe that’s a biological safeguard, you know? Because if you love your brother in the way we wish our daughters did, how would they ever leave home to marry anyone? It’s hard enough as it is.

When Parenting Means Steering Into the Skid

The more I've thought about it, the more I've realized that much of the advice given to drivers navigating hazardous road conditions actually speaks quite perfectly to parents who are navigating the precarious parts of parenting that are inevitable in the life of every family.

Parenting a Child with Anxiety

. . .My mother is a worrier too. And when I worried to the point of dysfunction, she worried out loud. On my wedding day: ">What if you don’t get better…people are already at the church…we can’t move a wedding…you don’t want that do you? And of course I didn’t want that and I didn’t want my mother to worry either so I tried to reassure her, which is quite the opposite of relaxing.  Today I have four children and one of them is anxious.  Here's what I do when her anxiety prevents her from fully living . . .

Please share your own favorite posts!