Tina Krause - The Savvy Moms Guide to Sons: 101 Real-World Tips to Improve Your Relationship—and Save Your Sanity

2014 by Barbour Publishing, Inc.

Print ISBN 978-1-62836-887-1

eBook Editions:
Adobe Digital Edition (.epub) 978-1-63058-530-3
Kindle and MobiPocket Edition (.prc) 978-1-63058-531-0

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Scripture quotations marked NIV are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version. NIV . Copyright 1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

Scripture quotations marked NLT are taken from the Holy Bible. New Living Translation copyright 1996, 2004, 2007 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc. Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.

Scripture quotations marked NKJV are taken from the New King James Version. Copyright 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Cover Design: Greg Jackson, Thinkpen Design

Published by Shiloh Run Press, an imprint of Barbour Publishing, Inc., P.O. Box 719, Uhrichsville, Ohio 44683, www.shilohrunpress.com.

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Why are boys so rambunctious? What draws little boys to mischievous play and daring adventures? Why do boys act and talk the way they do? How do they think and feel? How do I handle my sons teenage years? What about peer pressure? How do I release him into the world?

These are only a few of the questions mothers of sons ponder as they grow their little boys into men. Raising a son takes a lot of savvy, a ton of patience and endurance, a truckload of humor, and a generalizedalbeit murkyunderstanding of what makes a boy tick!

The Savvy Moms Guide to Sons provides 101 commonsense, real-world tips to mothers of boys. From the cradle to the college dorm, from his first step to the day he walks his bride down the aisle, this guide is intended to help you along your parenting journey.

Each tip comes with:

A Word from the Worda relevant and revelatory scripture verse,

Think About Itpractical questions and suggestions regarding that tip, and

Final Thoughtssome last words on the subject at hand.

The tips are in chronological order to make it easy for you to reference suggestions applicable to your sons age or stage of development. For example, Tip 1 begins at the beginningthe moment you first hold your son in your arms and imagine who and what he will become. As he delights and beguiles you, you will travel through the terrible twos and those precious toddler moments that will incite giggles one moment and produce havoc the next.

Tip 19 and beyond transitions from the holding stage into the molding stagethose formative elementary school years that lead into adolescence. You will retrieve action figures from the toilet, make mud pies even though you hate the mess, and catch lightning bugs (and various other insects) in a jar. He will charm you and drive you crazy all at the same time.

Enter puberty at Tip 55 when changes in your sons voice, appearance, and attitude shift faster than a race car in full throttle. Your little boy inches toward adulthood, and the transition is sobering as an ice bath. But hes still loveable, bright, and your pride and joy.

Finally, Tip 88 ushers you along the road to letting go of your son as he leaves home for college, a job, or military service. You purchase everything hell need (and much more) to help him to nest in his new living quarters while your nest feels emptier than a discarded soup can. Everything within you hangs on, longing for the holding days until you realize that as God severs the ties, He also soothes the wrinklesthe ones on your face and in your heartweaving a new pattern to your sons life and to yours.

The Savvy Moms Guide to Sons is designed to help you at whatever stage you are in, to hold, mold, or let go of your son. Whether he is five or fifteen, this book will provide some much-needed insights worth considering. So read on and, as you do, enjoy the journey!

Note: Many of the following tips refer to your husband or your sons dad as a helpful participant in the parenting processthough for various reasons, we know that many women are raising sons on their own. If this is your situation, please accept my best wishesand substitute close friend or relative as needed.

Perhaps you are a new mom of a bouncing baby boy. If so, you are about to board the train for the most exciting, wonderful, exasperating, rewarding, overwhelming, worrisome, and exhausting journey of your life. In fact, dont be embarrassed or think it abnormal if one day you find that you are the poor woman the store manager refers to when he announces: Attention shoppers, we have a lost mother in the store. If you should find her, be kind and point her back home.

Tackling the multifaceted roles of motherhood is like juggling twenty hats in the air at once. It is a lifelong journey, or as one wise woman said: Motherhood is a life sentence with no hope of parole. A mere few months of motherhood establishes an inevitable fact: Like the hick-town mayor of a small community, moms wear a number of different hats in their never-ending and ever-growing role as mom.

Growing into motherhood, you will become quite skilled at hat juggling. To illustrate, consider a few of these headpieces: You serve as a nurse, maid, waitress, chauffeur, chef, preacher, teacher, scholar (with a degree in experience), seamstress, referee, cheerleader, coach, and prayer warrior. In each of these roles, you will exercise the wisdom of Solomon, the patience of Job, the faith of Abraham, and the unconditional love of God.

Mothering sons is hard work splashed with colorful strokes of joy. After finding his parents wedding album, one little boy innocently turned to his dad and asked, Daddy, is that the day you got Mom to come and work for us? Thats pretty much how it feels sometimes. Your son will lead you through mountains of laundry, fields of dandelions, dirty diaper paths, rock-n-roll roads, rivers of tears, highways of heartaches, jagged childhood crevices, narrow tunnels of worry, junctions of pride and joy, and oceansdefinitely oceansof prayer.