i love my mom because she plays with me ...

I read a book with the children in the early weeks of May. It's title is I Love My Mom Because ...

As we read through the book the children smiled and agreed with the what the pages were saying; because she hugs me, because she holds my hand. But, when we got to the page that states, I love my mom because she plays with me, there was silence, pensive looks on the children's faces. Followed by responses such as "my mom doesn't play with me;" "my mom is too busy;" "my mom is too busy making dinner" ... then when the conversation petered out, I had a little boy say, "but my mom plays with me."
The way he said it, it almost didn't sound like he was sure he should share the information. It made me smile and broke my heart at the same time.

I do know that children's perceptions are not the carved in stone truth and I believe that each parent with a child in that group does in fact spend time playing with their child. But, what this conversation inspired me to do was give conscious thought at the end of each day to whether or not I played with the daycare children and with my own son. And I don't mean tickled and sang a song while I changed his diaper, read to him at bed time, or involved him in cooking with me. I mean truly took time from my day to devote whole heartily to play with him; zero distractions, truly present and engaged doing something that he chose to do. That's what those children were referring to.

I encourage every parent, regardless of the age of their child, to do the same.