Family Mottos

A few years ago I read a fantastic (one of my top five) parenting books, Parenting Breakthrough by Merilee Boyack.  This book is awesome for several reasons, especially her outlook and plan of raising self-sufficient children truly prepared to leave home as adults with a full "tool belt" of skills.  In addition, I loved her idea of family mottos.  They are like mini mission statements.  (For an excellent more extensive discussion on family mission statements, see Seven Habits of Highly Effective Families by Stephen Covey).  Mottos are short, quick reminders of who we are and what kind of family we want to be.  

I shared this idea at the Community Parenting Night last month and several of the parents were excited about them.   I'm trying to implement these more and more into everyday life.  And what's awesome is the kids are now reminding each other!  For example, one of ours is Prices are solvers not complainers.  It was awesome this week to hear one of my children ask a sibling, "what are you going to do about that?  Remember Price's are solvers not complainers."  

In addition, Prices are happy campers.  We still have a few kids that whine (please tell me this ends) so this is a nice reminder versus the nagging or my over-used line, "I'll be happy to...when you use a big boy/girl voice".

This last weekend Andrew was telling his Uncle about a hard puzzle in his spy book.  Uncle Tim was reminding him how doing this will help him be smarter and better at it now and in the future.  Those are the moments I throw in, yes Prices do hard things.  

We've also included Prices live the Gospel.  Notice it's not we try.  We just decide and we do it.  This takes out a lot of the gray in a world that is becoming less black and white.  

I know I've mentioned it before, but I grew up with "we hoe to the end of the row".  My point is that although this wasn't verbalized as a family motto, it definitely was.  It helped me finish little things, like hanging up the bathroom towel (instead of throwing it on the floor) as a teenager and reminds me as an adult that I finish what I start, completely.  These mottos have helped us define our family identity, WHO we are as a family. They give us focus and set a tone for where our family is headed.  Hopefully they become part of who my children are.

And because every post is more fun with a picture, here's my cute grease monkeys!!  Matthew is thinking he's doing "hard things" by helping Dad rotate the tires.