Good thing, Bad thing

First of all, before I get into the topic of this post, I thought I would tell you that at 3:45 Mattie fell asleep. Persistence paid off, though 2 minutes after she fell asleep Kenna woke up so no rest or work for me. Oh well.


Thought I would enlighten you all on a little nightly ritual here in the Smeltzer house. We were introduced to "good thing bad thing" in a small group we were in when Makenna was 1. At the time she was too young to participate, but we tucked it away for future reference and are using it now with great success.

Every night at bedtime we sit the girls on the bed and talk about their good things and bad things for the day. Then when we pray, we use the good things to tell God we're thankful and we ask Him to help us on our bad things. Kind of like toddler Prayer and Praise.

Usually Mattie's good things are "Jack and Charlie" whether we saw them that day or not, but she'll come around. ;) Kenna has become very insightful during this time. She recalls all her favorite highlights of the day in great detail and reminds me of all the times when she obeyed.

But its usually when she gets to the bad things that she really gets deep. You should know that she remembers just about everything. Seriously. So when she says "I don't know" or "I don't remember", its usually not true. For example, one day I heard ruckus during naptime and went in to figure it out. Mattie was still in the crib, but it was while they shared a room. Mattie's entire dresser had been emptied either into the crib or onto the floor. I looked at the girls in disbelief (nothing like that had ever happened before). I must have looked shocked as I asked them what happened. It was classic finger pointing from both of them. Honestly, I figured it was Mattie, because she's like that. Until I saw what was on the floor. Contents from the bottom two drawers, neither of which Mattie could reach from her crib. (I even asked her to open them to see if she could and she was a good six inches shy).

I look over at Makenna and say "Did you help Mattie empty these drawers?" No. "Did you do it by yourself?" No. I don't know what happened. I didn't do it. Mattie did it.

Well, I knew she was lying, but I had no video documentation. So, after a brief statement about lying being a bad choice, I made her help me clean up and then I dropped it.

And wouldn't you know at bedtime that night when I asked her what her bad thing was she said "my bad thing is that I emptied those drawers. I did it. I'm sorry, mommy." Melted my heart right there... that sweet confession on her own free will. And I knew it was working. That God was working in her little heart.



So, I thought I'd leave you with my good thing, bad thing for today.

Good thing: the miraculous update on Nate Pelz (see my facebook if you have no idea what I'm talking about).

Bad thing: I had no me-time today. I hate that.

But as I was reminded in another friend's blog... this life is not about me. God gave me the strength I needed for today, nap or no nap, me-time or no me-time. And I pray that each tomorrow will be a day that honors Him a little more than the day before.