Posted on August 8, 2009 - by Jus

5 Activities To Stay Truly Present With My Son

This week I commited to myself that I would take more ‘time out’ from the steamtrain of my day job and my business planning to spend quality time with my six year old son.  By quality time, I mean being truly present with him and doing something that I know he enjoys.  When life gets busy it’s very easy to fall into the trap of just ‘being together’ – going to the supermarket together, running my errands together, or just spending time in the same room doing separate activities.  I am blessed with a very patient child, who doesn’t often act out in order to get attention, which can make it easier to let this trap continue on for longer than it should.

As part of my commitment to stay more truly present with my son this week, we sat down last night and brainstormed what he might like to do with me each day.  He wrote these activities on our family calendar for the coming week and I committed to him that we would do these each day after school with him.

BOARDGAMES
One of the things I have enjoyed about my son growing out of his toddler and pre-school years is that we can now play a number of boardgames together, which we both really enjoy.  We really like Scavenger Hunt, Uno, Guess Who, and chess or checkers.

WALKING THE DOG
Our dog is a Kelpie x Collie and needs a great deal of exercise, so two walks per day is not unusual.  The beauty of taking my son with me on this walk is that he and I really get an opportunity to talk and discuss what might be going on in his mind.  This is the time when I find I can be most present with my ‘coach approach’ to parenting.

SPENDING TIME IN BORDERS
We love book stores.  Especially those that allow to spend as much time as you like in them, reading and perusing to your hearts content without being asked “are you going to buy that?”.  However, it is very easy for us to split up when we get to Borders, I head for my sections (cooking, self help and business) and my son goes up to the kids area.  This week though, we are going together and only going to the kids area.  We’re going to read together, explore together and buy something for my son to enjoy once we leave.

A MUM & SON DATE
My son loves nothing more in the world than food.  He also really enjoys it when we go out to a cafe or restaurant together, just the two of us, and share some laughter and discussion over a meal and dessert (of course).  Pancake Parlour is a favourite of his and is very kid friendly.

ARTS & CRAFTS
We have a big box at home which is full of papers, glitter, pens, pencils, glue, coloured feathers and matchsticks, felt pieces, buttons, paints and much much more.  We roll out the butchers paper and pull on a painting smock and get to work.  It’s great fun and easy to convince him to jump into the bath afterwards!

What will you do this week to stay truly present with your loved one this week?  I’d love to hear your ideas in the comments section below.

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