Being grateful and thankful for a child can be a challenge sometime. My daughter seems to want approval so she is the one who more commonly will tell you thank you without prompting and be very sincere when she does. My son is likely to begrudgingly tell you thank you after a protracted discussion about being gracious and other people’s feelings, although sometimes he is decidedly very much appreciative of someone or something.
With the season of giving upon us, and partially past us with my daughter’s birthday just a few weeks ago, continuing the work of thankfulness is a daily challenge. My daughter has just finished drawing all her thank you cards—a task she’s enjoyed quite a lot, even though it’s taken many sessions to get the work completed. Her brother even wanted to get involved and has pre-drawn on some cards in eager anticipation for upcoming birthday gifts.
Then today we had one of those less than ideal events where someone was most ungrateful (my son) and as parents it’s always embarrassing when things like this happen. My parents had arrived and brought my daughter and son a present. My daughter’s was a late birthday present of a yellow sparkly cape replete with barely-adhered glitter that is now all over our house (something I’m working on being grateful for myself.) She was happy when she opened the gift and asked to have it put on her. She wore it to dinner, dispersing glitter in the car, restaurant and sidewalk as she happily enjoyed her gift.
My son opened a bag to find two huge tennis balls. He shoved the present away. He pushed himself into the corner of the room and said, “I want another present!” He absolutely did not like the balls and was hearing nothing more about it. We got in the car and he continued his angry words about wanting another present, telling Mimi and Gramps he didn’t like his present, etc.
We had a conversation with him and told him it was okay to not like something, but you should still be grateful someone got you a present. It was a hard sell as we drove to the restaurant to meet Mimi and Gramps in the other car. When we got there Gramps called, saying someone had sideswiped his car and driven off but they would arrive shortly to the restaurant. His car isn’t in great shape and his estimation of two-thousand dollars is probably about right for the repairs, but they weren’t hurt so we’re glad they’re okay.
My son did manage to be grateful after getting some calories in at dinner and decided to go around the table and hug every member of the family in thanks.
When we got home I had to call my mother because my son and husband spent twenty minutes playing with those two hated balls, laughing the whole time.
The Big Boy Update: After hugging everyone at the table tonight my son stopped, thought about it and then wrapped his arms around himself and wiggled, saying he was hugging himself.
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: In the car my daughter said, “I’m thankful for my parents” after my husband had said something he was thankful for. We told her how nice it was for her to say she was thankful for her parents and were immediately corrected as she said in a plaintive voice, “I said ‘PRESENTS!’”
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