Being an Athlete.

I missed two days of blogging because my Internet "router" malfunctioned. After calling Verizon, the tech person was responsive by sending my new router within two days. Below are the blogs for the prior days and today.

March 3 (Tue.), 2009 {Fruit Salad}

We made fruit salad today. My daughter wanted to help make dinner, I think, and she suggested making a fruit salad. Even working with kids to make dinner usually involves more work on the parent's part, I agreed because I liked her initiative and her desire to help. So after the main meal, I peeled a banana for her to slice using a dull butter knife. My son wanted to help so I peeled orange slices for him to cut up also using a dull butter knife. He also scooped blueberries into the mix. We added apple slices last. The fruit salad was great. The kids ate a lot of the fruit salad because they helped make it.

March 4 (Wed.), 2009 {Compassion}

My wife told me she heard from Grandpa that my daughter had asked him how he was doing after being in the hospital for a short period. Then my daughter asked how Grandma (my mom, not my wife's mom) was doing because Grandma just came back from a dentist appointment. This revealed to Grandpa that his granddaughter had a caring heart and he was proud of her. My son also has a caring heart. But he, perhaps because he is a boy, expresses his caring in different ways. However young kids express their compassion, what matters is that they are compassionate towards others.

March 5 (Thu.), 2009

I have begun calling my kids "athletes" to try to get them to eat more. I feel that because they take swimming lessons, that I need to "bulk" them up with wholesome, filling food. So I call them "athletes" and explain that athletes need to eat to get the energy needed to do that sport. If they consider themselves "athletes," then they will eat sufficient amounts of food to be in tip-top shape, so I hope.