Makayla at 3 years old.

Makayla is my second child. Sometimes she is the most thoughtful and other times she is the most stubborn. I love everything about her. She loves to help everyone in the family(when she is in the right mood)

Makayla at 9 years old

Recently, Keith and I finished up a bible study called Crown Financial study( It is amazing and you can find out more information if you are interested at mycrown.org) Anyway, besides learning how to be a good steward of everything that God has blessed us with, we also learned that we need to teach our children how to also be good stewards. This involves so much, like taking care of the things they have(i.e. keeping there room clean and picked up) as well as helping your family(i.e. listening to your parents, being kind to one another) and using your money wisely( i.e. Tithing, long term saving, and learning the value of a dollar). Keith and I were stumped. We have known for a long time that we need to have a structured plan of responsibilities and chores and allowances for the kids, but we had never put anything in place because that means we have to stop and plan. We hate planning. But we did it anyway.

We had a funny incident happen yesterday and I thought you may enjoy it. Recently we had put into place a system of responsibilities and chores so that they could earn an allowance at the end of every week. Everyday Gwen and Makayla have to pick 2 chores out of a bucket and Konnor and Carolyn have to pick 1 chore out of the bucket. They are then responsible for doing their chores(with a happy heart of course). Yesterday Makayla's chores were Clean out the car and Sort the Laundry. She happily cleaned out the car and put everything where it belonged. Then she went on to sort all of the laundry into our laundry sorter, whites together, reds and pinks together, darks together,etc.. Before she was done the laundry sorter was overflowing with clothes. She became very frustrated and said, "I can't fit everything in here!!". I said, " Why don't you put in a load of laundry?" She responded with, "That is not my job. My job was to sort the laundry not wash it!" With that she walked into her bedroom.

About twenty minutes later she came back into the kitchen and said, " Mom, where do you want me to put the laundry in the dryer?" I said," Why? Are you doing a load of laundry?" She replied ," The second mile." This indicated to me that she had obviously thought about what our pastor Dan Yeary had been preaching on the whole month of April (His Sermons were titled The Second Mile) and she was ready to apply it. I questioned her, " Where did you hear that from?" She said, " Church." I replied," From Pastor Dan?" She said, " I do listen while I'm drawing in church. I just don't like staring at him the whole time."
I thought this was priceless!! It's neat to see Makayla growing up. She is a true blessing.