When Your Kids Get Along

For those of you parents with kids at home, the initial days and weeks of summer can be a real bear. Everyone is home with time on their hands; two ingredients just asking for a fight to break out.

Having older ones now, it isn’t as physically and emotionally draining as it is with younger children and mine aren’t as constantly at each other anymore. But they are certainly not the perfectly loving and obedient sinless children we all wish was possible. (But then we wouldn’t need Jesus :))

Normally when the conflict comes my middle child is involved. He is not always the instigator, but with him being sandwiched in between his sister and younger brother, he just usually ends up in it.  Whereas the oldest and the youngest have a big enough age gap that they normally don’t go at each other, but then they also don’t do as much together either.

Sometimes I think we overlook the blessings of the times when they do get along and have fun doing things together. And very often I think we inadvertently prevent moments for them to develop fruitful sibling relationships by keeping our kids so scheduled and/or allowing them to always be with their own friends.

Since mine are older and so busy with sports and activities I love that in the summer we finally have more free days and nights together to hang out without all the other distractions. It is what I like about Sundays, too, in keeping it a day of rest, not running around or scheduling play dates gives my own kids unstructured time to enjoy (and sometime fight) each other.

I started thinking about this the other night when my middle child was at a birthday party and my husband was out of town. My oldest, wanting a companion, asked her littlest brother to go for a run with her. He, of course, relished the opportunity. And though she wasn’t then able to go as far as she had originally planned, she didn’t complain when he got tired and they just walked.

This is when I happened to walk outside to visit with my neighbor and saw the two of them just walkin’ and talkin’ (and making Vine videos)- Sister/Brother Bonding Time!

And when they came back in with plans to watch a show together, he was beaming. Beaming because his big sister who he adores took an interest in him.

As their mom I want nothing more than for our family to be the safest place for each member. Where we each can be real and be ourselves and be loved unconditionally. Seeing my children get along and having fun spending quality time together is priceless. It is also the foundation to life-long adult friendships that I hope they will have with each other and their future spouses. With a glimpse of that future reality, it gives me greater resolve to make sure we are not so busy individually that we don’t allow for the most precious moments with one another.

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