When I first became a stay-at-home mom, I was determined to find all the fun activities in the area to go do with my boys. At the time, I had a four-month-old and a two-and-a-half-year-old who has A LOT of energy (One of my favorite things about him).

Naturally, I thought, we’ll go to story time at the library! I had heard such great things, but my work schedule never allowed me to go since it was always during the day.  It sounded like a great idea, I can finally take my boys to story time, I was pumped.

Well… it didn’t exactly go as planned.

When we walked into the room, there were probably 40 children and their parents packed in together. Apparently everyone else knew story time was the place to be!

As soon as the librarian started reading, my toddler made it very clear that he had other plans. While most children sat quietly listening to the story, my son and a few others wanted to run laps around the room. To be honest, I couldn’t even tell you what book the librarian was reading because I was mortified. I left feeling exhausted and disappointed.

Still, I thought maybe it was just an off day. So we went back. And guess what, the outcome was exactly the same. My toddler could have cared less about story time. So I thought about it, if my toddler has no interest in story time, why am I taking him? Is it because “good” moms take their kids to story time? If I don’t take him to story time, will he hate reading? Here comes the mom guilt. Turns out, my child actually LOVES to read, AFTER he has burned off some of his energy. Catch him right before nap time, and he is begging you to read him books. So, I signed him up for a free program through the local library system called 1,000 Books Before Kindergarten, here is the link if you live in the state of Georgia and are interested: https://georgialibraries.org/1000books/

We started going to the library in the afternoons to checkout books to read at home. He “graduated” from the 1,000 Books Before Kindergarten program right before his 3rd birthday. So turns out, he does like to read 🙂

SO what did I learn from all of this:

Is Story Time an awesome resource, YES! Was it the best fit for my child at the time? HARD NO. So instead of forcing him to go to story time because I thought it was what I “should” do, we started going to the park right down the road instead. My toddler ran around, he picked up sticks, threw rocks in the water, rode his bike which he calls his “motorcycle” and guess what, we were all much happier and I was way less stressed.

You Know Your Child Best

If you’ve been taking your child to an activity that leaves both of you frustrated and drained, let this be your permission to do something different. Not because what you are doing is wrong or because your child is “bad,” every child is different and has their own unique interests and needs. Some of the children at story time were locked in, they loved it, my child not so much, he wanted to be outside running around. As mom’s we can sometimes feel the pressure of doing what we think we “should” be doing, but when you look at the child you have been gifted,  because yes they are a gift, and parent that specific child, parenting becomes so much more enjoyable. Sometimes it’s simply choosing the activity that brings out the best in your child. It’s pretty cool to see my little guy zipping around the park on his motorcycle.

And because I am all about sharing what I am learning in real time, another mom I follow, shout out to Hey Shayla! suggested the book “The Child Whisper,” by Carol Tuttle and WOW did I learn a lot. Here is the link if you are interested, I plan to do a whole blog post about what I learned in the future. Stay tuned.

Book

With Gratitude,
Angie
Moved by Motherhood