I asked my kids something today..... and wow.

At dinner every night, we go through something with the kids. We do one of the following:

1. Tell them to tell us something new they learned at school that day. Anything. But it has to be something they didn't know before.

2. Play "Did you know". In this game we each take a turn starting out with saying, "Did you know..." and then we fill in the end. It can be saying something as simple as "Did you know my favorite color is purple?" or it can be as profound as "Did you know that Pluto is not a planet?" The point is to state something we want others to know that they may not know, personal or educational.

3. I ask a single question, and they have to thoughtfully answer it. They can't answer immediately. They have to think about it and answer it honestly. There are NO wrong answers here. The point of this is to get to know them better and get them thinking.

Tonight we did #3. And here is the question I posed (please forgive the punctuation): If you could have anything, ANYTHING! Pretend we are billionaires! If you could have anything for Christmas, what would it be?

I am in awe of the answer I got.

Their answer: We just want everyone we love to have the most wonderful Christmas ever.

There are days when I feel like I'm failing, failing as a mother. Days where I make mistakes. Days when I wish I had just a tad more patience and wished I hadn't raised my voice to them. Days when I feel like I could do better.

But on days like this. Days when they answer simple questions like this.... Well, it gives me hope. Hope that I may not be failing them as much I feel like I am some days. Maybe, just maybe, I am doing something right after all.