Category: motherhood

Lessons in Motherhood and Gift-Giving

Lessons in Motherhood and Gift-Giving

by No Makeup Mama ♥ 0 Leave a Comment

A few days ago, my oldest, Evangeline, turned 4-years-old. I had been planning to start a new tradition of making a photo book of the year for each of my kids birthdays – but after going through all my photos and photo books and scrapbooks, I’ve realized I need to choose a more “green” option that jives with my new minimalist lifestyle. So, I put together a quick video of highlights from her first year using the Google Photos app.

Voila! Memories stored for a lifetime! [Assuming there is no apocalyptic event that destroys all power on the planet – and in that case, I probably won’t be strolling down memory lane very often anyway.]

You can watch the video at this link:

Today was the party – a unicorn party.

Even though it was a small “family only” gathering and the majority of our local family couldn’t come, it was still a lot of fun – maybe even more fun because the absence of kids forced the adults to participate in the “Pin the Horn on the Unicorn” game. [Yes, there is video evidence below.]

Because of the changes we’ve been making to our perspective on waste and excess and consumerism and …life in general, we made two changes to how we celebrate birthdays in our family.

First, we emphasize experiences over gifts. On her actual birthday, Brett took the day off so we could all enjoy a day at the community pool [which is more like a water park]. We gave her a gift, but rather than making that a focal point of the day, we set it out in the living room the night before so she could discover it in the morning and then we didn’t talk about gifts again. We focused the day around the activities we were doing together.

To be honest, I’m having a hard time figuring out where I stand on the gift-giving thing. On the one hand, I love to give gifts. Brett and I enjoy giving gifts to our family members on holidays and birthdays and we make it a priority to give a gift to all the nieces and nephews each year. But on the other hand, I don’t want my kids thinking that birthdays and holidays are all about getting stuff, so I prefer that people not give gifts to my kids on these occasions. But I realize that is hypocritical of me, so I am trying to find a solution. I think we are going to try to find a way to give more experience gifts and fewer objects – and whenever possible, give the gift of quality time, which is the best gift we can give to our loved ones.

Second, we gave Evangeline a used gift. It was something she really, really wanted – a baby stroller – and of course, she has no idea that it wasn’t new nor does she care in the least. The motive here is not at all financial. It is sustainability. I don’t care what an item costs. I’m more concerned about the environmental impact of constantly making new things while sending old things to a landfill. I’m committed to buying used toys [just like my commitment to buying used or sustainably sourced clothing] because this just makes sense.

I realize that this won’t always work because my kids will undoubtedly grow up some day [😭] and start caring about price tags and all that [though not if I can help it] and they will want the latest and greatest stuff. But at 4-years-old, my daughter just wanted something with wheels to push her stuffed animals around in. If only life would stay this simple forever.

Happy Birthday, my sweet Evangeline. 💕

Karis

Lessons in Motherhood and Materialism

Lessons in Motherhood and Materialism

by No Makeup Mama ♥ 1 Comment

Yesterday, my oldest, Evangeline [3-years-old], went to the movies with a girlfriend, so my inner mamma bear was immediately preparing to soften the blow for my son [2-years-old], who I assumed would be devastated because he couldn’t go too.

My first thought was to take Theo to Target to pick out a new toy [from the bargain bin, of course – my kids’ FAVORITE]. I was still considering this as a viable option until it dawned on me how ridiculous and hypocritical it is of me to try to comfort my son with shopping.

Here I am, trying to teach my children that happiness does NOT come from stuff that you can buy – or even from the experience of shopping – and yet my first tendency was to have him buy something so he wouldn’t feel sad.

[Side note: This whole plan was based on my assumption that he would be sad. There wasn’t even proof he would be – and of course, he wasn’t the least bit bothered.]

Here was the perfect opportunity to teach my son a lesson about a). how to deal with disappointment and b). what gives real joy in this life and I nearly blew it!

So, when the moment arrived, I held Theo’s hand and said “Sissy is going to go see a movie with Charlotte and you and I are going to go to the park to play. How does that sound?” And he was perfectly happy with that. In those three hours together, he received more focused attention [though not completely because Josephine was also with us] than usual because of the absence of Evangeline. We played and laughed and I don’t think he ever thought about what his sister was doing.

In the end, I think I’m the one who learned a few things, not Theo. I was reminded of two important lessons about motherhood:

1. I don’t need to shield my kids from every disappointment. Even though it’s my natural desire to protect them from every possible moment of sadness, it is my job to show them proper ways to handle disappointments – and retail therapy is definitely not one of them. On the other hand, physical activity is FANTASTIC therapy [and good for you too]!

2. Possessions don’t make you happy. I believe that the greatest sources of joy in life don’t come from getting, but from giving. In this case, giving time and attention to each other, doing something that we love [being outside and active] was way more enjoyable for Theo and I than walking around Target would have been.

It makes me wonder if my children are so stuff-obsessed because that’s what I’ve been modeling for them. Are kids born with the desire to accumulate more and new stuff? Or is that something I [with the help of our consumerist society] am instilling in them?

I clearly have to be more cautious about encouraging materialism in my kids.

Anyway, we had a great day and we didn’t come home with any cheap plastic doo-dads that would be broken or forgotten in a matter of days. Just a few photos of our day together.

Karis