Best and Worse Part of the Day

We have this ritual in our family: every night we gather at bedtime and each of us shares our "best and worst" part of our day. We do this even when one of us is traveling -- whoever is gone will try to call around bedtime to participate, if possible.

The rules are simple: we start with the kids, and everybody shares something from their day in each category. You gotta have one of each: finding a "best" part helps put some perspective on even the lousiest of days. Similarly, we sometimes laugh how good a day was if the worst we could come up with was "xyz"! But the "worst" is not meant to be a complaint or "dumping" feast -- no, merely sharing the facts with the rest of the family, perhaps the telling helping to process and put the event in perspective...

Lately we've added a third category, the "sensory experience" of the day, and that has quickly become a fun addition that we all look forward to! The "sensory" may be good, bad, (&ugly), and can involve sight, sound, smell, taste, or even just plain weirdness. For example, the first ever was when papa reported seeing a transport of stacked port-a-potties (latrines) on his commute home from work! Sometimes the sensory experience ends up being the taste of a new food, hearing or seeing a wild animal, or, invariably, the occasional description involving a public restroom or the school cafeteria...

Above all, this little ritual helps our family gather one last time before we go to bed -- even though we're together for most of our evening meals, and we tell each other about the events of the day -- it really helps to have a dedicated time for each & everyone to share, and then be able to put it all "to rest" before going to sleep.

HOW and WHY? When the kids were younger, we always cuddled and read aloud at bedtime (and we actually still do!). But as kids get older they often outgrow cuddling, yet still need that closeness to their families.
We started this on a family vacation in the Utah, and even had a "Talking Stick" (a Native American tradition -- click here for instructions on how to make one). Only the family member holding the stick gets to speak -- no interruptions are allowed! Now we don't need the talking stick anymore, but whenever we find that the speaker is getting interrupted too much, we grab the back-scratcher I keep next to my bed, and whoever yields it, he or she hold the floor!