Sing It into Their Bones
Singing with Daddy
That they should set their hope in God, and not forget the works of God… (Psalm 78:7)
My Dearest Daughters,
As we rolled out the tubs, trunks, and boxes of holiday decorations this year, my thoughts returned, as they usually do, to the days when all of my children were little. The day fell, as it always does, on the Monday after our Homestead Fair. We come home tired and happy, the children all a little disappointed that the fair is over, yet filled with great anticipation—because now it is time to set up Christmas.
This year, a real cold front blew in on that very day, and suddenly it all felt wonderfully authentic. Four-year-old Ari warmed the softest places in my heart with his jubilation as we opened each box. Out came the nativity set, the manger, the wise men, a simple bell, a box full of pinecones—and with every piece he squealed with delight, leaped up and down, and recounted an entire story connected to that object from the year before, a story I had long forgotten.
But I remembered, too—only my memories traveled much farther back than last year.
I remembered you, Helen, setting up the tiny people in the Christmas village. I remembered Blair helping me untangle the cords of lights. With every decoration in my hands, I felt so close to each of you, held together by a day that has stayed nearly the same, year after year (except for one Christmas lost to the flu—but that was a memory, too). Each piece stitched us back together again.
I have been thinking a great deal about memory these past months, and I feel as though the Lord has been speaking to me about it. I want to share these thoughts with you, because I believe they matter—not only for this holiday season, but for every season of life.
Making memories with your children is not an insignificant thing. It is a shaping force—of their development, their identity, the trajectory of their lives, and the soul of your family as a whole. I have come to see this more clearly with every year I mother.
Our friend and psychotherapist, Rita Jreijiri, once said that memory is not a camera—it is an editor. Memory is fed by emotion. If our emotions are bitter, we will carry bitter memories, edited and replayed through those same lenses. But if our emotions are loving, joyful, and steady, those memories will expand and multiply, like the loaves and fishes in Jesus’ hands.
That realization is both humbling and weighty. Our children will carry what we build.
A shared experience becomes a memory because it is bound to meaning and relationship, and what is bound that way tends to endure.
I have not done this perfectly, but I have tried, intentionally, to anchor our lives in shared rhythms. Daily story time from the very beginning. Scripture memory. Prayer. Always family meals. And the longer I have mothered, the more intentional I have become. I even laugh sometimes and say reading aloud has become my near-religion—morning school reading, toddler reading, and nightly story reading. Again and again and again.
Family dinner has always been paramount. We gather around the table for shared food and shared joy: fresh warm bread, a set table, napkins and silverware, sometimes a candle or a sprig from the garden. A meal served as a gift of love, prepared with intention, offered with a prayer that this, too, will become a memory that shapes my child’s future.
As your father and I have grown older, our appetites have grown smaller, and for a season I let breakfast, for myself, fade. But after hearing Ruth Ann Zimmerman speak about the sacredness of family meals, I felt called to bring family breakfast back as a regular feature that included me. And so we did. The children now wake to warm smells, to a set table, to music in the kitchen, and I see again how deeply these simple things matter.
Another memory-anchor you know well is family devotion time—gathered in the schoolroom, singing, prayer, reciting Scripture, reading aloud, each in turn sharing a thanksgiving to God or someone. These are not just moments; they are the threads that bind hearts.
Fashion your lives around things that happen daily, weekly, yearly. This is why Christmas has remained powerful in a fragmented world; it is still one of the great collective memory-makers. But why leave this sacred experience only to Christmas?
Family walks. One-on-one time. Gardening together. Playing games. Years ago, when you older children began attending Wednesday night youth meetings and the younger ones were sad to stay behind, I told them, “Every Wednesday is Mommy Day.” We folded laundry together, worked in the garden, rode bikes, took walks, went swimming, played games—something every single Wednesday. I tried to make it feel like a really special evening just for them.
Just a few months ago, as I walked with Nicolas, now thirteen, he told me that year was his favorite of his whole life—the anticipation of Wednesday, waiting to see what surprise I would “cook up.” I teared up as he told me. And I resolved again: memory matters.
You probably remember the true story of I Am Regina—about the two little girls captured in the Penn Massacre and carried off into captivity among the Native Americans. Nearly nine years later, after a mass release and treaty, the children were brought back. But many of them no longer remembered their families. They could not even remember their own language. Even their own parents couldn’t recognize them.
Yet one mother walked along the line of released children singing a hymn in German—the song she had sung every night over her little girl before she was taken. And suddenly, one girl broke from the crowd and began to sing along—in German. She couldn’t speak a word of English or German, but memory and music led her toward home and her mother.
I sang “Jesus Loves Me” to each of you every night when you were little. And as you know, your autistic brother began to sing that song three years before he could ever speak a full sentence. Long before language came, music and memory were alive in him.
So create these memories knowing this: even if a child ever becomes lost, confused, wounded, wandering—those shared memories may be the very thing God uses to lead them home.
The word re-member means to be made a member again. And that is exactly what memory does. It ties us back into our family, our relationships, our church, our God.
That’s what I feel every time I open the Christmas boxes. With every decoration, every pinecone, every tiny wooden figure—I am “re-membered” back into you.
So, create memories for your children that will always tie them to you, to their Lord, to their church, and to the land. Let them be re-membered into God’s people, God’s creation, and God Himself for their whole lives.
Be intentional.
Be inspired.
Be faithful.
And be, always, a memory-making mother.
With all my love,
Mom
