Acts of Service

We have quiet time every day where the kids are expected to do something quiet while Daisy takes her nap. The other day Mike was off from work and I decided to take a short nap in our room so that I wouldn't be completely worn out for rehearsal that evening.

We had been working on cleaning up the entry/piano room before quiet time.  All the kids were asked to get their belongings out of that space and put them away before heading to their rooms. They all did a pretty good job of it and then headed off to their rooms.

Since Daisy and Amelia share a room we usually have Amelia do quiet time on the couch in the basement or up in our bedroom. On that day we asked her to go down to the basement since I wanted to nap in our room.

I had been laying down for a little while when I heard Mike coming up the stairs. He sat down on the bed next to me a whispered "Guess what Amelia is doing." I had no idea what she might be up to and I said so. "She's cleaning up downstairs, but she wants to surprise you.  She even asked me if she could run the vacuum."

It turns out that rather than going to the basement, Amelia had decided to continue working in the room we had started on.  She is definitely a child who shows love through acts of service.  She is the first to want to help out and she seldom complains when asked to pick up after herself.  I love that about her.  I definitely appreciated the work she did for me that day and it amazes me that she thought to do it all on her own.

I continue to be amazed by how well the names we chose for the kids fit their personalities. Amelia means "industrious, strong worker." The was no way we could have known that our sweet baby girl would grow up to fit her name so perfectly.