January 2023

After having the grandchildren here for a couple days to celebrate Christmas, I noticed a word that seemed to work itself into many of the conversations – the word, No! Realizing that many of my decorations are not “kid-friendly” the parents of our three soon to be two year old grandsons were saying things like: “No, just look at the manger scene” or “No, do not take the ornaments off the Christmas tree.” Even our four year old granddaughter Charlotte needed to be reminded, “No, Charlotte, we cannot open presents just yet!” After doing some research, I learned that the average toddler hears the word ‘no’ an astonishing 400 times per day! At first I felt that 400 times seemed to be an exaggeration. However, just stop and think about how often we say things like: “no running, no throwing, no hitting, no jumping on the furniture, etc.” We are constantly telling our children how NOT to act – instead of telling them positive things like: “walk please, put it down gently, be gentle with your hands, or sit on the couch please.” Even though it is good for children to learn the word ‘no’ and what it means, I feel that we use the word ‘no’ more often than looking for or saying a positive statement.

Yesterday, I spent so long building a snow fort that my forearm muscles ache as I type this. I have no regrets – after a lot of awkward shoveling, our five-year-old visiting friend was delighted when two burrows connected to make a tunnel, daylight breaking through the hole in the middle. Hope you too have been able to sculpt something out of snow this winter – there’s sure enough of it around.

I hope everyone enjoyed the mild temperatures over the weekend. We had plenty of low to mid 30s across much of the state, while southern Minnesota saw some upper 30s and lower 40s! These temperatures were 15 to 20 degrees warmer than average for this time of the year.