In the last few days, several children have told me things they appreciate about our family and at the risk of sounding self-inflating, I’m going to share them over the next few posts.

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Recently ds11 came home and told me, “I never knew what a nice family we had!”

Knowing that didn’t come out of the blue, I asked him what he meant.

He told me, “Well, I thought we had a nice family but you know, sometimes brothers are annoying. But I see that really everyone in our family is very nice and treats each other nicely.

And whenever we come home, you always smile at us and say nice things like ‘I’m so happy to see you!’ Not everyone does that.”

(My kids are very careful about not speaking negatively about others, so they won’t directly say if they see something at the home of someone else or anywhere else that they don’t like. And as interesting as I would find specific feedback, I don’t encourage that kind of discussion.)

Believe me, I’ve had years of complaints and suggestions about how I could do things better! It’s nice when they start to have a more appreciative eye.

I was struck by how much a smile meant to my son.  Smiling at your child doesn’t seem like such a big deal, does it? It really isn’t a major action to take, but it has the power to make a person feel warm and loved inside. And the absence of that smile was striking enough for my son to think about how much he appreciated the family he has.

Avivah