Girl's Day Out

My daughter won two $5 gift card to Chili's at our annual family gift card exchange over the Christmas holidays.  She is so sweet.  She brought one to me and said, "This one's yours, the other one's mine.  We're having a Girl's Day Out on Saturday!"  So sweet.  I couldn't be anymore pleased that she chose me to use her gift cards with, rather than with one of her friends.

There are so many ways that I want to be able to connect with L.  Right now she's eight.  I keep hearing that when she's a teenager she won't want to talk to me anymore, but I don't think that has to be how it goes.  I think that sentiment that so many share about teens and their parents has become the status quo, and in so many ways, I see how dangerous it is to agree with the status quo.  I am not content with letting my relationship with my daughter slip into limbo just because she hits her teenage years.

All day I've been thinking about my Mom.  She loved her Mother very much.  She tells such great stories about her Mother.  I would have loved to have been able to meet her.  My  Mom's parents had to work very hard.  My Mom was born in 1935 - the middle of the depression, in a very rural part of Tennessee.  My grandfather was a foreman of a sawmill.  He also farmed the land that my grandmother had inherited.  My grandmother was constantly busy.  My Mom said that the day before she was born, her Mother canned peaches.  (Wow - that's a whole other topic of conversation there!  Usually the day before I give birth, I can be found crying, and begging God for relief!  LOL!)

Every story that my Mom tells about my Grandmother are stories where they were working together.  It was a necessity!  There was so much to do.  Laundry, field work, house work.  My Grandmother could not take my Mom to a restaurant for a Girl's Day Out - there was no money for stuff like that!  So instead, she brought my Mom alongside her and they worked together and formed a bond that I can literally feel when my Mom talks about my Grandmother today. 

That is the kind of bond that I want to develop with my daughter, and yet I find it difficult to do so.  Certainly not because I don't have any work around the house to do!  Oh, I've got plenty of chores to take care of during the day.  My hang-up is that too often I make the choice to do the chore on my own because it's easier that way.  Meanwhile, L wanders off to her room to play with Barbies or her doll house.  Ugh.  So not only am I not teaching her the value of the work of a mother, but I lose another chance to form that tight bond with her that I am hoping for. 

I am not a big one for New Year's Resolutions, but man, am I making this a resolution!  So to make it official:

My New Year's Resolution for 2007 is to bring L alongside me as I do my daily chores around the house.  And I don't want to just nag her with directions for the work, but I want to connect with her while we work together so that her teen years become just more time to add to the memories that we make together as Mother and Daughter.