Des and I attended a seminar on Parenting at our sons school last year – it is an Opus Dei school – and one of the speakers there mentioned that he dates one of his kids each Saturday for breakfast. I think he has more than 5 kids, so each gets a Saturday breakfast, and then after one round, it starts again.
We now have 5 kids and they are growing fast! Sometimes we get stories from them about mean classmates, or how they don’t end up being picked for teams, or just how they learned new things. Sometimes we get shocked about what they know, or what jokes they say. So this week I started having one on one dates with them… well the three older ones since the younger two are still “home based”.
I did it all in a week, but I do know that as they grow older, and busier, then we might have to do that one child a week date too. It was refreshing. I got to speak to them about school, the family, and just spend good quality time.
Of course, this shouldn’t take away from having quality time at home with the whole family present – away from gadgets and television and youtube – but it does mean something to me to spend time with them one at a time. I don’t know if it meant anything to them yet, but it was good for me 🙂 Hope I get to sustain it. 🙂
I love being a dad!
