After reading a phase guide for each of my children’s current ages, I knew I needed to get more intentional in celebrating their uniqueness and interests.
If you’ve never seen a phase guide, it looks like this… I’ve saved the link on the picture, so if you click it you can learn more.
Our church’s children’s ministry uses the curriculum that is also made by the creators of these special parenting guides.
After writing down some notes on each of my kids’ interests I decided to do a special day with each of them.
In November my daughter and I went to a mall to be the first customers at a Charming Charlie accessories store, we also rode a double decker carousel (side note: taking a picture looking backwards while riding a carousel can lead to this mom getting motion sick.) We got personal MOD pizzas, I gave her my old digital camera and taught her basic photography, we got drinks at a cafe and brought a My Little Pony board game, then finished with a round of put put.
It was good, but exhausting. The next one, I decided would be much simpler. 
My son and I spent a day in December at the St Louis Science Center.
I wanted to plan another day for each of them. His birthday is April 6th, so I dubbed the 6th or so of each month is a “Titus day.” In March we did Taco Bell, Monkey Joe’s, and McDonald milk shakes (only for Titus since I wasn’t through with Whole30.
I joined a class field trip on March 14 for my daughter whose birthday is December 14th. So from then on the 14th or so of each month has been declared “Elodie Day.”
Now each kid has a special day each month to look forward to and help plan. Their birthday months are covered already of course.
But on all other months, we do a few things that make each kid feel special. Last month Elodie Day involved going to IKEA with Daddy and getting a new light for her room. All four of us went to the science center on the 7th last month for Titus day.
We have enjoyed each time we focus on the special interests of our kids. Having an approximate day of each month gives us an easy way to set something up.
How about you? What’s one of your ways to spend individual focused time with each of your children?
manageable mess 