An interesting educational night.

Last night I attended a stake YW/YM activity. We had a good dinner and then listened to Matt Richards give an excellent talk about being true to oneself. I actually go a ton from it in regards to being a good parent just by some of the thing he mentioned about he and his wife.

Anyway, I drove home with my friend/leader and a few of the young woman. All the way the girls talked about boys, dating, and all the stuff that's on a girls mind. It was very interesting to listen to. I mean, for one they are actually opening up and asking you for your opinion or what they should do about a certain situation. Then they start telling us stuff about their home and family life. It wasn't only a conversation, but a really great learning experience for me as a mother. I feel I am always good about listening and offering advice when asked, but once a girl opens up about her relationship with her parents I am so willing to ask them questions. I really want to know why things are good or why they are bad. I want to learn from them to help me be a better mother to my girls and hopefully allow us to be close. I desperately want my children to know they can talk to me about anything and I am quite aware that relationship needs to be nourished from the start, even at their very young age. I told these two girls my concerns and that I wanted to pick their brain for vidal information that would help me improve in this area. One of the girls said, "You will not have to worry about it, you are so easy to talk to, your kids will come to you". It was really good to hear, although she was probably just saying that because I am not her mother.

I learned a mother needs to be there ready and willing to listen and to know when to stop asking questions. Know when to back off. Allow the child to come to you. Make sure to share an emotional bond...not just I am you mother do what I say, but share a rich meaningful trusting relationship. Allow your child to make up their own mind and solve their own problems. In a teenagers life, time moves rather quickly so when a fight is over or a boyfriend is out of their life leave the subject alone. Just some of the things they shared with me that I wanted to pass along.

So this was not the end of my interesting night. We continued to take the girls home and my friend/leader decided to drop off her daughter first so she could get to her homework. Then all of the sudden her son and all his friends jumped in the car because she had already promised them a trip to wendys. I know I didn't mention this before, but among the boys was this boy one of the yw had been talking about. She really likes him and he asked her to homecoming, but now things are very awkward between them...man I am so glad I am done with highschool. Anyway, I looked over at my friend/leader, who by the way is 46, and told her I was coming. First of all I wanted to see if I could get any information and second I wanted french fries. So what conversations took place in the next 40 minutes was just as educational as with the girls. Now I must say boys don't open up about girls, and to tell you the truth I didn't ask. They pretty much just told me who they were and what they did. So as far as I was concerned my mission had failed...I had not found out about the girl and boy and their upcoming date. Somehow, as we were dropping the boys off they started to talk about their parents. Very interesting. So I asked them why questions and what they could do better. I couldn't believe it. These boys actually gave me straight sincere answers. So of the things they shared it sounded a lot like the girls answers, but added parents should not be uptight...go with the flow more.

I feel like both of these groups of kids gave me something very important. I feel a little more empowered on how I can improve and be a better mother. I know each one of my children are different and so will our relationship be, but no matter what I want them to know how I feel about them, about my beliefs, about how important my family is to me. The three most important things I have ever done in my life are 1. baptism 2. get married in the temple and 3. have my three girls. My family really is everything to me and the driving force of my motivation to be better and do more.