Planned Parenting

How I love my little familia, but some days I feel like I'm just trying to fill the hours till bedtime and get through the days. Darryl and I have been talking about doing a lot of things, making time to set some family goals, come up with a family motto, talk about traditions, etc. So when we won a weekend getaway at the Nottawasaga Inn as the door prize at Darryl's Christmas party last year, we decided that it was time to cash that in and put some serious thought into the most important aspect of our life. Our family. We plan our finances, our education, our weddings, our vacations etc. but how much time do we put into a plan for raising our kids??? I've read two awesome books lately (The Parenting Breakthrough-Merrilee Boyack and "Have courage for the great sorrows of life and patience for the small ones; and when you have laboriously accomplished your daily tasks, go to sleep in peace. God is awake."

I loved a lot that I read but something I feel like I need tattooed to the back of my hand is this:
"The biggest mistake I made is the one that most of us make while [mothering]. I did not live in the moment enough. This is particularly clear now that the moment is gone, captured only in photographs. There is one picture of the three of them sitting in the grass on a quilt in the shadow of the swing set on a summer day, ages 6, 4 and 1. And I wish I could remember what we ate, and what we talked about, and how they sounded, and how they looked when they slept that night. I wish I had not been in such a hurry to get on to the next thing: dinner, bath, book, bed. I wish I had treasured the doing a little more and the getting it done a little less."--Anna Quindlen