Making your home a Haven - Part 2

I think this is actually a Home - wouldn't that be awesome?  A home like this would always have to be filled with music!



How to Make Your Home Sing

This weeks challenge in Making Your Home a Haven is two fold.  One, play soft music everyday in your home.  Choose some type of peaceful music your family enjoys.  And two, Focus on using peaceful words and maintaining peaceful relationships.  Because my kids are so little, I need to role model gentleness this week to them.  We are currently "helping" Joshua, our almost 2 year old, learn how to be kind and gentle with his little brother.   One of the main things we are focusing on is not to make Nate cry.  See, there are consequences when Nate cries - he makes LOTS of noise and he makes a VERY sad face (Nate is 9 months old).  Josh is learning that ne doesn't like to see that sad face and we actually are seeing him physically stop himself from doing things that he knows makes Nate cry.  It is fun to watch - but I'm reminded that I have to teach my boys this through my actions too. 

Courtney over at Women Living Well, offers up some great ideas for music choices in today's original post.  Playing music is something that we do a lot in our home.  Everyday, I have 5 CD's in the player ready to go.  Three that are my kids, which we listen to for 2 weeks straight as a learning tool and 2 that are "mine" - Twila Paris, Sandi Patty, Steven Curtis Chapman, Jim Brickman . .just to name a few.  I love having music play.  I notice that when it is playing, the house truly is so much more peaceful.  So pick your music and play it today.  As far as playing instruments - Darryl plays his guitar almost daily and the boys love it.  I don't play the piano as much because Josh loves to play as well - so instead we help him play a little and I play (with headphones on) while they nap :-) And we sing ALOT . . we are hearing Josh start to "sing" too as he hears songs he likes.  Courtney also lays out several points on how to have peace in your home through your words.  I liked one in particular - "Yelling at a bud won't make it bloom".  I'm not a yeller - never have been but this is so true!  How easy it is to just say "no", "don't do that", "stop it".  Instead of taking time to use the situation as a learning tool.  When I have to help my child, I try to stop everything I'm doing, get down to their level, make them look me in the eye, and I talk to them in a normal voice.  I can already see this benefiting both of us and we live in peace most days.

So, are you up for the challenge?  I hope so - a peaceful home is a fun place to be!

Remember last weeks challenge?

Reflecting . . .

Did you light a candle everyday and pray for your family?  I must admit, on Friday, Saturday and Sunday I forgot.  It got really warm here so I had all the windows open.  Lighting a candle was the last thing on my mind.  BUT, I noticed that my days were better Mon-Thurs, with that Candle lit.  It did remind me to slow down and focus on the things that really mattered.  I'm anxious for that fall weather to come back - I will have a candle lit every day!