A little quality time...

So...don't call the truant officer on me or anything, but yesterday I picked Ilaiasi up 45 minutes early from school and took my gaggle of goofballs to Chick-fil-A for a late lunch so that Ilaiasi and Ovaka could have some fun on their indoor playground.  Ilaiasi's been struggling a lot lately...too many changes, too much stress, too little of Mom to go around...and it's taken a toll on my sweet eldest son.  He's been acting out a little bit -- nothing major, but my normally obedient boy has been talking back, pouting, being sneaky, and basically just doing things that are very out of character for him.  So, I wanted to do something fun with all the kids, but specifically, I wanted Ilaiasi to feel special.  I just finished the book The 5 Love Languages...have you read it?  It's a really remarkable book, and I would highly recommend it if you're looking to improve your relationships with others.  It's directed towards the marital relationship, but the lessons learned can be applied to any relationship you have.  It basically says that there are 5 "love languages," or ways that people feel love.  Ilaiasi's "love language" is Quality Time.  In other words, spending time with him is the thing that makes him feel most loved, and even if you do lots of other things to show your love for him, if you don't spend quality time with him he will not feel like you truly love him.  As you can probably guess, my three little runts have made spending quality time with Ilaiasi somewhat difficult lately, and I really believe his acting out can be directly attributed to my inability to focus my attention on him like I used to.  So, even though he can't be the sole center of my universe anymore, we spent a little quality time together yesterday, and I hope Ilaiasi went away from the experience feeling special and knowing that his mom loves him more than anything in the world.

No, really, I SWEAR they had fun at the playground today!

Brothers at play

Ilaiasi being a good big brother and playing with Ovaka