The "Talk"

I remember when Max was around six, I started researching and learning different ways parents had the "talk" with their kiddos. We began the chats about pornography with each kiddo around 4 years old (a great starter book for us was "Good Pictures Bad Pictures"). And as much as that was an ongoing conversation, we knew we were ready to chat a bit more about babies and how they are made. We wanted the conversation to be proactive on our end to create space for an open, ongoing dialogue.

But, I was clueless on how to approach it all.

Gratefully, there are so many tools and resources out there. I can't remember where I was first introduced to this book, but it has been a gem for us!

We chose to follow along with the recommendations of beginning the "talk" as a fun part of turning eight and to make the experience fun and memorable. It even mapped out potential dialogues and referenced a super helpful book to go through together.

Max was our first round, and it was awesome. Super empowering for him to know where babies came from (we'd just had Abigail, and he was an early eight), and what a gift from God the whole process is. And how marriage between a man and woman is so much more than a certificate.

Since then, I've been amazed at how ongoing, fairly organic conversations pop up, how questions about what they hear from other places come into their thought process, and how they are able to steer what they have learned in the home with what the world shares.

So cool to be part of that journey with them!

And, as we've stuck with the age of eight, it was time for Alexis.

Until it wasn't.

The "early eight" wasn't the right window, and we were just fine with that. Nor was the "mid eight" window. And right about the time we were feeling like there was a good window, the move across country set us back, and time was needed to recenter, and adjust to all of the new. As "new" began to feel like "routine" again, and as the house began to feel like a home again, we felt the nudge, knowing it was time.

We have this dry erase wall calendar near the kitchen, and it's become one of my favorite places to add something in, and then wait for someone to notice it.

And she was SO excited to see her date night on the calendar.

We used the ideas in the book to build excitement about the evening and that we'd be sharing something super important with her, but not giving it away.

She couldn't wait.

And before we knew it, we were off! Headed to a spaghetti dinner (her choice!), and a snippet of time completely focused on this amazing girl. We cherished her stories about school, the things she loves about Florida, how she loves spending her time, and listening to her laugh.

And then we chatted about babies and where they come from. We used the picture book together, "Where Did I Come From?" - although we do generalize more and don't read word for word. But it is a super helpful guideline.

The whole evening was a gift we will cherish. To fill her up with truth, and the beauty of marriage, and how much God loves her.

As parents, this chat really brings us peace of mind. We know these kiddos are exposed to all kinds of things all over the place, and our hope with this is to create a space of trust, where they know who to go to for questions.

It's a beautiful thing to remember holding this sweet babe and then to sit and talk with her and the beautiful girl that she is. So grateful for the experience.