Even though my little girl is only three, I am already seeing the “more is more” attitude from her. She has all that she needs and some of what she wants, but she still wants more. She is an only child and I do not want her to grow up spoiled so I am working on ways to teach her to be thankful for what she has.
I work for Feed The Children, and literally on a daily basis, I am reminded that I should count my blessings. I believe many people would be more thankful for what they have if they were able to see what I do. My best day so far was when we went to a Title 1 school to distribute books to elementary school children. At one point, the principal asked kids to raise their hand if this was their very first brand new book they have received. There were about 30 third graders in the library at this moment and all but four kids raised their hands. I immediately pictured my daughter’s bookshelf at home that is packed full of books that I started buying even before I was pregnant with her. This made me tear up that children who are 9-10 years old have never had a new book before this distribution. In that moment, I was thankful that my daughter has new books to read and was thankful to work for this amazing nonprofit.
The question is, how do we instill this thankfulness in our children? How do we teach them to count their blessings every day? This is an ongoing quest for me and would love to know what other moms are doing!
