Scaredy cats can be brave

While most boys James' age have been watching beat-em-up movies with their parents and love Batman, Spiderman, and X-men, James is still scared of any movie or TV show with antagonists or characters being mean. (Most of our Disney collection sits on a shelf gathering dust.) And Megan is scared of everything else. She still trembles at every sound and asks "what's that noise?"

But we are making progress, however slow. Megan now only cries for a couple minutes when I drop her off at nursery and she always gets excited about going to church and attending her own class. And yesterday, she passed a huge milestone. Kendall Hood, James' primary teacher (and my new visiting teaching partner), came over to play with James to develop a better relationship with him so she can handle him better in class. Although Megan clung to me for the first half hour, she warmed up to her and actually played a memory card game with her and James. She even talked with Sister Hood and didn't cry when I walked out of the room for a minute. Then, after an hour and a half, when Kendall had to leave, both James and Megan hung their heads with such a sad look on their faces. I talked up how proud I was of her and bragged to Daddy in front of her about how brave she was.

Being brave is a big deal in this house. We never miss an opportunity to praise James or Megan for being brave. And I'm planning a Family Home Evening lesson on Courage and asking the Lord to help us not be scared.