Lifegiving Planning With Your Family

Do you enjoy planning? As a creative girl, I don’t always appreciate the idea of planners and I certainly don’t schedule every moment of my day (or month or year or or or!!!!) Yet spending time pondering and praying over dreams and visions for the future does capture my attention and help me hone my focus for the important things. We even taught our children to make plans for their days, early on …

As our family grew—with Sarah born in 1984, Joel in 1986, Nathan in 1989, and Joy in 1995—we increasingly made numbering our children’s days a priority of our parenting. We still tried to have our weekly planning breakfasts, but overseas ministry, numerous moves, and then living out in the country forced us to be more creative about planning. Whenever and however it happened, though, we tried to plan weekly for the spiritual influence and training of our children’s lives. It was a priority in the patterns and practices of our parenting and family life. We also took time out around September or January each year, sometimes as a weekend getaway, to plan for the year ahead—for us and our children.

Our children would take part in the planning too. When they reached an age where they were able make a list of some kind (I allowed a lot of latitude in list making), we would involve them in setting their own goals. We never wanted our children to become passively dependent on us to number their days for them. Rather, we wanted to model for them how to begin thinking about their own lives and how to follow our example in setting goals for themselves. We deliberately avoided making it an onerous duty and enforcing list completion by certain times; instead, we modeled goal making as a positive and fun thing to do.

Each child approached planning differently. We didn’t insist on one right way but simply enjoyed seeing each of them get involved and excited about planning their lives in ways that made sense to them and reflected their own personality preferences. Whatever they did, and however they did it, we would delight in their goals and affirm their efforts. We focused on the children’s work, not just the product of their work. Sally and I were still mostly the ones who were numbering our children’s days, but we were also teaching them the first steps in acquiring the habits and skills they would use as young adults to develop a “heart of wisdom” through following the guidance of Moses’ prayer.

We considered planning for each child’s spiritual life and char- acter development—practices and qualities of their relationship and life with God—to be distinct from planning for their schooling and activities. We would help them develop their own personal goals for Bible reading, Scripture memorization, and prayer, and plan times to do them. We could create charts of varying sizes, colors, and complexity, depending on their age, to help them keep track of their consistency and progress. We used a variety of methods to help them be faithful with chores and meeting other character-development goals.

When they reached their teens, although we would engage in planning and spiritual life discussions with them, we began to trust them to make their own plans for their days and for growing in wisdom with God. For our family, we saw the process of planning with our children as a relational, dynamic, and organic process, not as just a task or procedure to be accomplished.

Numbering our children’s days was the first lifegiving practice we initiated in our home. It brought the life of God into our midst in very practical and practicable ways for our children. As they began to think about their own goals and how they could follow God and grow in wisdom to please Him, they began to think in terms that brought the reality of God who is “our dwelling place in all generations” (Psalm 90:1) into their own place of dwelling and their own generation. We were training them to think of God not just as an impersonal source of truth to be known or maker of rules to be followed, but also as the living God in whom they would find real life and develop a real relationship.

Lifegiving Parenting: God Gets In Through the Doors.

Long ago, reading “The Door in the Wall” by Marguerite de Angeli, captured my imagination. Then, when I walked through Oxford, and I began to see such doors everywhere. The walls are to protect those inside from the onslaught of dangers in the world from coming in uninvited. The door was to provide the few who were safe, beloved, trusted individuals a way into the place of sanctuary and a way for those who were prepared for the outside world to foray out for life matters.

Such a door gave me an imagination for parenting. We are to provide safe sanctuaries and places of beauty and life-giving for those inside our doors. And a place for the influence of the outside world to enter when deemed appropriate.We provide doorways for their hearts to all that is good, true, beautiful.

Little ones take in all facts as truth. That is why we protect them when they are young until they have developed strong values based on truth, beauty, righteousness and goodness. They do not need to see all the horrific things happening in the world when they are too young to bear it. As they grow stronger, we walk with them to help them develop muscle for coping. Then we open the world of home to other influences little by little, walk into the world side by side with our children to help them learn how to manage to flourish in the outside world.

Lifegiving parenting is not a program to implement in your home or a set of principles and practices to say and do. It’s not a formula, a ritual, or a set of rules. It is a way of living. From one perspective, it is like building and cultivating a Christian home—creating a structure and atmosphere in which the Spirit of God can work to bring the life of God to you, and through you to your children. To consider how the life of God gets into your home, I think it might be helpful to consider an illustration about a house, which has only a limited number of openings where things can come in.

The primary way the life of God gets into your home is through doors. There are numerous symbolic doors in Scripture, especially in the New Testament—doors of faith, judgment, and opportunity. Jesus calls Himself “the door” to salvation (John 10:9). But perhaps the most picturesque door is in Revelation 3:20: “Behold, I stand at the door and knock; if anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and will dine with him, and he with Me.” Jesus is speaking to “those whom I love” (3:19), asking if He can come in and sit down at their table with them to eat.

As parents, you want to be sure that door is open in your home, that Jesus is invited into every bit of life, rhythms, relationships. . It is, of course, the door to eternal life in Christ, but it is also the door to welcome the love of God in the person of Christ. Remember, too, that Jesus said, “By this all men will know that you are My disciples, if you have love for one another” ( John 13:35). So keep your doors open for others whom He loves and who love Him; they will bring Christ’s life in with them. Lifegiving parents open the doors of their homes to Christ and His followers to let the love and life of God in.

Tea Time Tuesday: Pancakes, Patience, & London

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“Each cup of tea represents an imaginary voyage.”

Catherine Douzel


Miss Tea Cup, Would you like to go to London? I have a meeting and I would very much like not to travel alone.”

“ Of course, I shall be your travel friend. But, you must know, even if they don't have strong tea available, I will be happy to submit to the other black stuff if you deem you need ,something hot, strong and sweet to make your trip viable."

And so she did accomodate me--some coffee, because there was not a strong tea available. And so we shared in the fun.

Last week took me to London for a meeting with some kindred spirits who care about children, parents, family, home, education. I boarded a train, and finally walked. The first destination was a charming, very old, traditional pub, first called Duke of Clarence. As this is just opposite Horse Guards, (more in the podcast) and 10 Downing Street, you can be sure for hundreds of years, colleagues met to discuss political plans, wars, finances, royalty and all the matters that government required. After all, what better way to build diplomacy than over a pint of something bubbly.

It is around the corner from the Old Scotland Yard. This pub where I met a friend, (Jacqui) for lunch, adventure and curiosity. Most popular here is fish and chips or steak and kidney pie (both traditional). We opted to split ham and chicken pie! And of course a berry crumble to finish it all off. It is said that Winston Churchill occupied the upper floor called Pol Roger to discuss all sorts of issues involved during his years as a prime minister.

Westminster is the area where parliament, 10 Downing Street, Westminster Abbey, Big Ben, Buckingham Palace and St. James Part and so much more live. Such a very fun and busy place to visit.

After lunch, on my way to the meeting, I had a photo with one of the valiant Horse Guards soldiers with his horse. When I held out my hand, the horse began to nibble my fingers as though I had something there he would enjoy. Twas fun indeed.

Consequently, several books I want to recommend from my own childhood were about horses:

books--Black Beauty by Anna Sewell and The Wild Stallion--Walter Farley

Feasting on pancakes this week

Most of us in the UK will celebrate Shrove Tuesday, which is a feasting of sweets before Ash Wednesday, when anglicans traditionally begin their contemplation on Easter Tide. Before going into a time of contemplation, we will make a gazillion pancakes—for me, 100% whole wheat (recipe in The Lifegiving Table) made with vanilla yoghurt instead of milk, and we will have an assortment of things to throw into the cakes according to preference—for me, it’s salted, roasted Walnuts this year, Clay, blueberries; Joel, chocolate chips—and will provide for others grated apple and real maple syrup.

Life, Travel and Flourishing in a Foreign Country is a paradigm for life.

Learn to accept the fact that you will be out of control, often.

Be Flexible and Cultivate patience

And so much more! I hope you will love the podcast on my membership about the “Ways of God” and more in my podcast today.

Horseguards, War Rooms, Westminster Abbey—all on today’s show—my favorite places to visit.

Horse Books--Black Beauty by Anna Sewell and The Wild Stallion--Walter Farley

Finally, a saying that I find so true as we face these challenging times:

In tough times we all hope for knights in shining armour or the cavalry to show up and effect change. Dean Devlin--screen writer

Praying for all the precious ones caught in the raging war. I’m praying for you, too, my friends!

Cultivating Virtue & Character in the Real World: 10 Gifts of Heart, Chapter 3 (#2)

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“Excellence is an art won by training and habituation. We do not act rightly because we have virtue or excellence, but we rather have those because we have acted rightly. We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act but a habit.” --Aristotle

As a grandparent, I am committed more than ever to support Sarah and Thomas to the training and inspiration of their young children. Character is the pool from which they will live and make all of their life decisions. Virtue, moral excellence expressed through godly character, takes a lifetime to build, yet is it one of the best gifts we can give or our children. I love to read to them, to inspire the imagination, to awaken wonder in their heart of how they will grow up to be heroes in their own lifetime by working hard, learning to serve, becoming aware of the needs of others. I was recently telling the story of the artist Rembrandt to one of my littles:

Showing my sweet one a beautiful art piece and allowing them to engage in its beauty opened the opportunity to then talk about how Rembrandt became such an expert—by many years of training and practice. Rembrandt became a master of light and  a detailed painter, exquisite faces by training, practice, and years and years of painting, over and over and over again--practice. His skill was developed over many years. And so it is with any craft, skill, degree or accomplishment.

Of course, this is also true of character and a Christian testimony--

the character that is habituated to improving, developing integrity by practice, stretching to work hard, to do the best, to exceed expectations comes from daily practice and personal integrity.

Those whose ideals are set high and aim, each day to pursue those ideals will have the opportunity to become excellent in any field.

This comes from an inner grid, the way one learns to see life and expects himself to live. We called this "self-government," when we trained excellence of character into the very fiber of our children's souls.As a grandparent, I am all about words—they guide, inspire, form the very brains and values of us as humans. I want my precious ones to have the same opportunity to have the pathways of their minds filled with the “ways of God.” Children grow up to love what they hear, understand, know and ingest.

It has been many years since we began our parenting journey. Over the years, my belief in the value of training and shaping my children’s character has only grown. So many times, our discussions turn to lessons they learned long ago …

Everyone Needs the Comfort of Home

The other day found me busily tending to many needs. There were calls to make, laundry to run, and inevitable dishes that follow meals at home. I finally had a chance to take a cup of tea to my favorite chair and rest a moment, and once more it struck me: though home making always takes a lot of effort, it is worth it. We all —mamas, too!—need the comfort to be found in home.

In a world that rebelled against God’s original intention, too many are left with no understanding of the Genesis mandate or the importance of home building. Broken families, divorce, abandonment, passivity, and abuse have plagued family history and have left scars on the hearts of children grown into adults. The vision of home as a place to flourish and grow fully into healthy persons has too often been lost in the busyness, distraction, and brokenness of both our secular and our Christian cultures.

Add to that the impact of technology in recent years, as social media tends to elevate virtual relationships over real-life, face-to-face encounters. Tweets, profiles, and statuses have replaced personal conversations. Gathering around the table for food and family discussions, lingering on front porches for long conversations over coffee, whiling away evenings with family and friends—all these have been replaced with quick trips through the fast-food drive-in or fifteen-minute meet-ups at a local coffee shop. There is little time or space for instruction about life or discussions about truth. Our souls seem to be filled with the sawdust of a lost generation.

Corporate moves have displaced people from their relatives; megachurches have replaced local congregations; and so many of us have become accus- tomed to growing up without a physical, local community of friends with whom we share life every day and who hold us accountable. Neighborhoods have become merely places to hold the dwellings where we sleep, grab food on the go, and meet our bare needs for existence. Sometimes we are lonely, and we do not recognize what has been lost.

As a result, in so many ways, we have become a homeless generation.

For encouragement in your own homemaking, may I suggest the book these words came from?

Winnie the Pooh, Friendship and TTT

Miss Teacup was off again. I think she feels much like me. I found her warming by the fire.

This bleak midwinter weather, constant rain and windy storms, and freezing cold—why it’s just too much for a girl.” “Oh, I can’t agree. more, Miss Teacup. It is why I appreciate you so much. Please come warm me with your liquid gold. I, too, am in need of solace and warmth!”

So, friends, I hope you will join us today for Tea Time Tuesday and warm up with a little reprieve of delight for yourself.

Today, one of my favorites speaks to us about the profound importance of tea:

“I don’t feel very much like Pooh today,’ said Pooh. ‘There there,’ said Piglet. ‘I’ll bring you tea and honey until you do.’

Oh how I love Winnie the Pooh. To think of the joy of having a kind friend who would ply you with tea, and in his case, a jug of honey, until you feel more yourself.

We all have those times when we feel out of sorts and as though no one “gets” us or that we are unique in our circumstances or relationships. C.S. Lewis knew what it was to feel a bit “different.” He said,

“Friendship is born at that moment when one person says to another, 'What! You too? I thought I was the only one.”

And he is so right.

When we feel someone knows us and still loves us and understands us and our deepest thoughts and dreams, we are so very grateful. I pray you will feel seen, loved and affirmed in our time together for Tea Time Tuesday.

Be sure to grab a cuppa something—and maybe even a little treat, and breathe in friendship and peace for a few moments. I will put a photo of some amazing cakes and special bakes I found yesterday for an out of town friend who is visiting, two angel friends who are coming to my house for dinner, and for my Bible study friends and or children later today—whoever gets to these amazing cakes first gets to consume them.

Some highlights for todays’ podcast, Teatime with Sally:

A Treatise on Winnie the Pooh

Children, and adults, need to have at least a part of their hearts and souls filled with belly laughs, innocence, friendship, adventure and a tiny escape from the world at large. Our family loved Winnie the Pooh everything, (books, dvd’s, art) because it was so beautiful and fun—and each of my family was like the personality of at least one of the characters. (More on my podcast about that!) We loved this over Tea Times on Sunday afternoon. Twas wonderfully fun.

Food:

Today, I talk about Chicken Kiev, chicken Cordon Bleu, fish pie, and all sorts of ways to easily put together a dinner for your children.

Classical Kids book: Story Orchestra: 4 Seasons in one (and information about the classical study of musicians and their stories and resources on LIfewithsally.com—my membership—you will love this series.)

Friendship stories and verses from the Bible (also a series coming up in my membership—lifewithsally.com.

Mostly, I just love spending time with you and hope you are having a great day!

Shaping A Heart with Character: 10 Gifts of Heart, Chapter 3 (#1)

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“But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control; against such things there is no law.”

GALATIANS 5:22-23

The work of a mama is never done. So they say, and I can definitely confirm the saying’s truth! Watching over our children’s character can be exhausting, yet it is some of the most important work we will ever do. To give our child a virtuous heart, to teach them to value hard work, patience, relationship skills, truth-telling, keeping their word and so much more is to bless them for their whole life. It does take time to create pathways in their hearts and minds to love virtue, but so very important to their well-being.

“You never let me get away with a single thing, Mom!” My sixteen-year-old child looked at me with a dramatically tragic face and tears spilling over big, blue eyes. “Why can’t you just understand that I’m a teenager? All of my friends have attitudes, too, and their moms let it slide. I’m just feeling emotional.” Her eyes were flashing with perturbation now. I sighed.

Confrontation, especially with my children, is surely my least favorite thing in the world. All I had asked was that she empty the dishwasher and load the dishes. The roll of her eyes, the mutterings under her breath (“It’s always me; the boys never help”) and the thump of her reluctant feet had prompted me to suggest that perhaps work was simply part of life and that she had a choice to make about her attitude.

Our confrontation at the sink, as with other mother-child confrontations, continued far beyond that dishwashing moment. We talked afterward. I shared some relevant scriptures. I reminded her of our standards as a family. I hugged her. I encouraged her. I sent her upstairs to recover and to have some time to think and pray. And then I sat back on the couch, exhausted, knowing very well that ten such conversations might happen again the next day with four of my sweet and less than perfect children in the house.

Moments like that, though they seemed tedious, were charged with some of the most important work I did as a mom. I knew then, and even better now, that I was training my children’s hearts forming their faith, and strengthening their character through those confrontation. I know you will be encouraged by the podcast today—I was! Just in the preparation.

What If Everything is Changing?

The changes we’re seeing in our current time “under the sun,” not just in matters of home and family but also in attitudes toward Christian truth and morality, are of the fundamental kind, the ones we couldn’t or didn’t want to see coming, but that now we cannot avoid—the prevalence of divorce and fragmentation of families, conflicting ideas about God, challenges to the Bible’s authority, rejection of once widely held Christian standards and beliefs.

We’re seeing increasingly dramatic confrontations over some of God’s foundational “solid rock” truths that provide stability and safety from the storms of life. Even though we as believers are building our homes “on the rock” of Jesus’ words, more and more homes built “on the sand” surround us and are vulnerable to the storms (see Matthew 7:24-27). Sandy foundations for many are being eroded and washed away.

David asks in one of his psalms, “If the foundations are destroyed, what can the righteous do?” (11:3). It’s a good question. What happens when the foundations change? What is our response when our fundamental values are no longer honored? What do we do when the foundations we live by are rejected by those around us, or even by our country?

As a psalmist of Israel, David’s answer was a simple reminder of what followers of God have always known to do—to trust God because He reigns from His temple in heaven and will protect the righteous (see 11:4, 7). As king of Israel, though, David could not foresee what his question perhaps presciently foreshadowed for the future of his country.

About four hundred years after David’s reign as God’s king over all Israel, the ancient foundations of the Promised Land, already split into two kingdoms, were being further decimated—the northern kingdom of Israel had already been conquered and scattered by Assyria, and the southern kingdom of Judah (land of Jerusalem and the Temple) was less than a decade from being overthrown and exiled to Babylon for seventy years.

In the midst of all that change and many prophecies of coming judgment, God offered an indirect answer to David’s Psalm 11:3 question through Jeremiah, a prophet to Judah: “Thus says the Lord, ‘Stand by the ways and see and ask for the ancient paths, where the good way is, and walk in it; and you will find rest for your souls’” ( Jeremiah 6:16).

When the foundations and fundamentals of Christianity that have provided stability for us for so long are rocked by challenge and change, and Kansas seems like a distant memory, the answer is not to panic, or fight, or just give up.

The answer is, in fact, to be like Dorothy in Oz—to adjust and adapt, keep going, keep believing, and never give up the vision of home. The biblical answer to David’s question, and to ours, is to trust that the God we know is faithful and the ancient paths we know are good. In other words, when things are changing around us, we stay faithful and stay the course. In that path alone we’ll find peace in the midst of conflict.

Whatever else we may do in response to the changes happening around us, the one thing we cannot do is neglect our families. The eight heartbeats of lifegiving parenting covered in chapters 2–9 are an attempt to define, at least in part, what “the good way” will be for serious Christian families to walk in as we navigate through our uncertain time “under the sun.”

Tea Anyone? Tea Time Tuesday: Aggresively Happy

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“The path to Heaven passes through a teapot.” – Ancient proverb

My wonderful friends,

How I wish I could have each of you over for tea to my little home today. I would pick your brain, hear your thoughts and dreams, share with you mine. To have the opportunity to share in real friendship is one of the treasures of my life. So do come if you are in the area.

I love my friends here. And the way they talk. This week, a lovely woman was paying a bill at a store and she had her friend hold the leash of her dog. The pup begin whining thinking his owner was leaving. The owner turned around and in a very posh accent said,

“Oh, you Silly Little Sausage!” I think I shall say that to Darcy sometime. It was a giggle moment.

There are so many different tidbits in my Tea Time Tuesday podcast today, but I haven’t time to write about all of them—you will just have to listen. Meanwhile, take the advice of someone whose quotes I love:


You've gotta dance like there's nobody watching,love like you'll never be hurt,sing like there's nobody listening,and live like it's heaven on earth.

William W. Purkey

music: Sleep Sound in Jesus Michael Card

Steve Green: Hide them in. your heart

Books: that affirm love to your sweet ones:

Wherever You Are, My Love will Follow

Written and Illustrated by Nancy Tillman

Guess How Much I Love You (20th anniversary)

Written by Sam McBratney

Ten Little Fingers And Ten Little Toes Padded Board Book Board book by Mem Fox –

Picture Book, August 23, 2010

Make trays and have a picnic in side —croissant with raspberry jam, pan au chocolate

coffee, choc almonds, graham cracker bears, gummy bears, buy lidded cups online—for toddlers

Have fruit unhand:grapes, raspberries, sliced apple or pear

Finger sandwiches

cheese bites

  • Join Joy and me Tuesday, 6 Eastern Time , Tuesday, Feb. 15

  • for an Instagram live about Cultivating Happiness in a Dark World and so much more.

    Meanwhile, get your copy of Aggressively Happy by my daughter, Joy Clarkson. Today is launch day.

Giving the Gift of Friendship, 10 Gifts of Heart, Chapter 2 (#2)


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GIVING THE GIFT OF FRIENDSHIP
Teach Your Children to Put Others First


“True humility is not thinking less of yourself; it is thinking of yourself less.”
~ C. S. Lewis

My kids and Clay are truly my best friends.(Harder and harder to get all of us together. We missed Sarah & Crew, who couldn’t make it.)

We understand one another the best. We like the same food, (generally speaking), we all drink tea! We are also different as can be. Some introverts, some extraverts, etc. We have conflict from time to time, we live all over. But, we are each others people and our home was the place we learned how to make and become one another’s friends.

As a mother, you’re faced with the challenge of a world that generally teaches people to think mostly of themselves. But Jesus taught us to “love your neighbor as yourself” (Matthew 22:37), and Paul taught us to be like Christ and “not merely look out for your own interests, but also for the interests of others” (Philippians 2:2).
Your task is to help your children develop a Christ-like heart, mind, and soul in a self-serving culture in which they will live as adults.

Our children will adopt a “putting others first” heart only if we first help them have God’s mind about selflessness. Instructing our children in what it truly means to put the needs of others first will enable them to be great friends and have great friends.

How does this happen?

Set a good example: Little eyes will always be watching! You’re their first model. Are you displaying an example of serving joyfully? Or do you dread putting others first and see it as a daunting task?

In your own friendships, model the same behavior that you would hope your children will exhibit. As your little ones watch your interactions, they will learn and be inspired by your own selflessness.


Model opened eyes: It’s so easy to create virtual “blinders” that prevent us from seeing the needs of people around us—all we see is what is right in front of us. Teach your children to open their eyes to the needs of others.

Talk to them about various situations that others are in, whether friends or strangers, and
about how they would want to be treated if they were in another person’s shoes. Focus on the Golden Rule:
“In everything, therefore, treat people the same way you want them to treat you, for this is the Law and
the Prophets” (Matthew 7:12).

Model opened ears: Being a good listener is a crucial aspect of becoming a great friend. Encourage your children to follow James’s advice to always be “quick to hear, slow to speak and slow to anger” (1:19).

Home is a wonderful and comfortable place to practice and learn listening skills. For instance, learning how to ask questions and listen is a great way to make friends. Role-play a mock conversation with a friend by having your child ask you questions and listen to your response, and then have them tell back to you what they heard, not just in your words but also in your expressions, tone of voice, and body language.

Model at home showing genuine interest in others by interviewing mom or dad about their life story, or asking siblings about their day.

Make the dinner table a place and time of discovery, with each person finding
out new things about the others. When we ask questions and listen, we are showing others that we care about what they have to say.

I hope this conversation will give you lots of ideas!