In his book, Green Beans and Legacies, Robert P. Newberry offers a list of nine basics for parenting. One of them is: A lot of quality time is required to raise a successful child.
The author uses his career as educator, counselor, therapist, lecturer and consultant to share advice and tips on raising successful children. However, Newberry especially uses his experience as the parent of three grown children. In the chapter on the above Basic, Newberry shares examples of how he and his wife spent quality time with their children, but also how others — like a naval officer who spent six months a year away from his family — spent quality time by reading into cassettes while he was away. Nowadays, with FaceTime and Skype, absent parents can spend quality time with their children even if they are far away.
When I became pregnant with our first child, my husband and I decided that I would stay home with our children. I enjoyed playing games, reading and playing with Lego with them. Just because a mother stays at home doesn’t necessarily mean she is giving her children quality time, however. Newberry states in his book: “I know of other parents who are physically with their children often, but are present to them rarely in terms of attention, care and concern.”
I’ve also known mothers who have worked full-time but were able to spend wonderful quality time with their children in the evening and on weekends.
So how do you get quality time if you’re working long hours? Newberry offers an example of writing a Christmas letter to each of his children every year. “Each letter included our own personal reflection of how he or she had grown and matured through the previous year. The letter provided an opportunity to offer encouragement for upcoming challenges and to convey our strong support and concern for his or her well-being.”
When our children were small, my husband worked 60 hours weeks. However, when he was home, he spent time reading to our boys before bed and as they became older, they shared their love of music by playing together in our own family band. In fact, most of our children began playing musical instruments (not because we insisted, but because they wanted to) taking the example of their father’s musical talents, and spent much of their free time learning songs on the guitar, piano and drums.
Quality time with your children is possible whether or not you are a full-time homemaker or work a full-time job.
I highly recommend Robert P. Newberry’s book, Green Beans and Legacies as an invaluable resource for helping parents raise successful children. Click on this link to download the Kindle edition or this link to purchase the paperback book.
For more information on this Basics and on Newberry’s book, Green Beans and Legacies, click on this link: http://www.robertpnewberry.com
Plot Line and Sinker (Ellen Gable, Author) 