MOPS

I joined a mom's group (it's called MOPS - Mothers of Preschoolers) that meets every other Thursday while Campbell is in preschool. They have daycare for Blake. Blake doesn't like being dropped off - he screams and cries like he's being tortured - but the ladies say he does fine after I'm gone. The first day they were laughing because he kept "making eyes" at the girl next to him on the buggy ride.

This group is huge (maybe over 100 moms in my session?) & ultra organized. We are assigned a table that has a discussion leader and a mentor mom who is an older mom with grown children. There is a schedule for bringing treats and volunteering in the nursery and there is a speaker every week. I've really enjoyed my first 2 meetings & I wish it hadn't taken me so long to find out about it!

Last week the speaker was a certified life coach who talked about Intentional Parenting versus just being a Survival Parent. Her advice was to start with the end in mind. In other words, what values do you want your children to have when they leave the house for college? Also, she talked about how you need to know your values and do your values line up with how you spend your time and money? Look at your calendar and check book and if it doesn't reflect your values either those things that you think are important to you really aren't or you need to re-prioritize. It was a great speech and I felt so inspired and refreshed afterward.

Tonight I was telling Gabe about the speech and were were talking about our values. Here's what we came up with.

• Liv's
• optimistic
• emotionally intelligent
• hard working
• compassionate
• grounded
• purpose driven
• sense of humor
• generous
• grateful

• Gabe's 
• independent
• family centered
• not materialistic
• respectful

Now, are we living those values out and how do we go about teaching and instilling those values in our children?!? Yikes!!