Kristine asked,
What to do about a 3 yo child who wails and screams with minor injuries (like falling down onto his hands while running…no blood or scrapes)? Everything sounds like an emergency. At this point, I respond to everything calmly and briefly, almost dismissively, but I do need to find a way to curb his response. I want to be able to tell when I really should be running to help him. Anyone have any previous posts, experience, or wisdom to contribute? Thank you!
Kristine,
I respond much like you describe, with one addition: if the injury is minor, I admonish him not to overreact. For a 3yo, I might say,
“No, this isn’t a reason to cry. Hush. I see a tiny spot of blood color but there’s no blood coming out. You’re ok. Go play.”
Once he gets a little older, I would use a firmer voice and be more blunt about it:
“You need to control yourself. This does not hurt badly enough for you to cry.”
I might even add,
“You’re acting like you are very badly hurt, but that’s not true. That’s like lying.”
If I can tell that it’s not serious, I also make a point of correcting the behavior before I closely inspect the injury. “No, first stop crying so you can tell me what happened. I’m sorry; I can’t understand you when you’re crying.”
Terresa asked,
Perhaps you ladies have addressed this before… We are a family of almost 8 living in a 1200 sq ft, 3 bedroom home… one for Mom & Dad, one for girls, and one for boys. We have no playroom for toy storage… HOW do we store toys/games in way that easy to keep organized and is difficult for kids to pull out and dump ALL over the bedroom??? We’ve already culled the toys several times and we are careful about what does come into the home…
We were a family of 9 in a house exactly that size…then 10…then 11…then 12. With so many people in the bedrooms, we thought it best to keep toys of there. Instead, we opted to keep our small collection of toys in a corner of the living area. We sometimes rotated toys, putting whole groups of toys into storage for a while, then swapping them out to make everything new and exciting.
Games were kept in a cabinet, off limits to anyone too little to clean up his own mess.
It was not a perfect system, but I think it worked well as long as we worked on it. The instant we stopped paying attention, it was a huge mess. The nice thing about small houses is that while they can be utterly trashed in the blink of an eye, they are also quick to clean up. 
Gencie asked,
What Bible translation do you use: For personal reading, for study, for reading to the kids?
Our church uses the ESV so we sometimes use that, especially when we’re doing church related reading or study.
I’m also really fond of reading the Psalms and other poetic passages in the old King James.
But for most uses, we prefer the NKJ because it reads so much better. It retains much of the poetic rhythm of the old King James version, but is just a little easier to understand. I especially like it for reading aloud because it sounds so much better than more modern translations. I think the formal language helps to remind us that we are reading holy words, while the slightly updated wording makes it easy enough for most people to comprehend.
- Smockity Frocks
- Raising Olives (currently posting once/month)
- The Common Room
