No-no Liam, no-no

I can scarcely believe that my little guy is 7 months old!  The time has absolutely flown and I'm sure it goes exponentially faster the older he gets.  There has to be some mathematical equation for that right? 

Look at that face, purely angelic right?

So recently Liam has been getting super curious about EVERYTHING.  I know this is the way of babies everywhere and in general I think curiosity is great, but it has forced me, in some circumstances, to bring out that word that is the bane of a child's existence.  NO!  "No Liam you can't eat the magazine.  No Liam you can't eat the bow from Grammy's birthday present.  No Liam you can't eat the kitty's tail." On and on it goes.  And the kid isn't even mobile yet!  I'm certainly going to have my hands full when he can actually crawl. 

Having to use the word "no" isn't easy.  What parent likes telling their "no"?  I know I don't really care for it and I certainly don't want to be a kill joy but the Bible says in Proverbs, "The rod and reproof give wisdom: but a child left to himself bringeth his mother to shame" (Prov 29:15) and "He that spareth his rod hateth his son: but he that loveth him chasteneth him betimes" (Prov 13:24).  Time and time again in the Bible parents are instructed to lovingly discipline their children. 

"But he's only 7 months old, he doesn't do anything wrong yet" you say.  Ha!  If I didn't believe that that people were born with a sin nature before (which I did) I certainly do now.  When Liam was 6 months old he had his first play date with an adorable little guy around the same age who is the son of a friend of mine.  We sat them on a blanket outside and gave them each a toy.  Immediately they were stretching and grasping for the other one's toy.  And just this last Wednesday night at church in the nursery Liam was taking toys away from a sweet little lady sitting on the floor near him.  Now you tell me how he learned that, without any siblings or examples of that sort of behavior?  Yeah, that's what I thought.

I love my little man to pieces, and I want him to grow up to be an honorable, respectable, and respectful man who loves God, like his father.  That's going to take a lot of love as well as a fair dose of discipline and guidance.  There is this false idea perpetrated on parents today that it is wrong to set boundaries for your kids and wrong to say "no".  More and more often I am seeing the results of parents who never say "no" and to be honest it's scary.  What's going to happen when that child becomes an adult and someone finally tells them "no"?  They are going to be completely unequipped to handle that!  

That doesn't mean I'm going to be Mean Mama and tell Liam "no" all the time because, again, there's no joy in that, nor is it Biblical.  There's a fine line and it takes a lot of prayer and seeking God to walk that line and I intend to do just that.  God willing my son will learn that I tell him "no" because I love him and because I want God's best for him!