I let them go alone, with their dad. I crawled in bed with a book, and was nearly asleep when they came home from seeing the big fireworks at great grandma's parking lot (that faces the big baseball stadium). I heard them. Distantly. Hazily.
I bought the sparklers for them. The boys are at scout camp all week long. Our big family table is reduced to a tiny thing with all but one leaf taken out. We can nearly touch each other's noses when the four of us are sitting down for a meal together.
When I asked a young mom raised in the Church what helped her stay active (in context of "Did you guys do family home evening and scripture reading as a family growing up?") and she credited family dinners as the biggest influence on her spirituality. She said they always gathered, with rare exceptions, and her dad would go around the table, asking how every one's day had gone, what they had done. She remembers chattering non-stop, with patient parents listening.
So if I whimped out on the holiday celebrations but showed up for family dinner, will it matter in the long run? Will Dad just be the fun memory parent?
And no matter how closely we build our home next to the bonfire, where will our children end up, spiritually?
