It was just a tiny cut.  No gushing blood.  No broken bones.  Just a little swelling on his nose and a trickle of blood from the tiniest cut.  To Daxson and me, it wasn’t a state of emergency.  But to Joseph it was an earth shattering event.  An event that would entitle him to storytelling rights and lots of pampering. 

I’ve learned that lots of the things we consider to be small things as adults are worthy of ceremony for little children.  Cuts, bumps, and bruises are a just one example.  The little things in their lives sometimes require some imagination on our part.  How can we turn a tiny cut into a momentous moment?  It’s all in our attitude.  Sure, we could tell them to brush it off and move on, but sometimes it’s not about the physical hurt as much as it is about the emotional hurt.  Their little souls need nurturing. 

So how did I handle the tiny cut?  I swooped him up and snuggled him and then brought him inside to begin the “ceremony” of fixing it.  I got out “the hurt basket” (taken from Katrina Kenison’s idea in Mitten Strings for God) and got to work.  I washed the cut and dried the cut, put some “medicine” (Neosporin) on it and dramatically covered it with a band-aid.  Joseph looked at himself in the mirror, satisfied and surprisingly, all better.  He hopped down off of that counter, proud to wear a badge of honor on his nose as he retold the story over and over throughout the day.  And me?  I lost maybe 5 minutes from my day as I fixed him up, but I gained respect in my son’s eyes as I taught him a lesson on the importance of taking care of one another.  Totally worth my 5 minutes, wouldn’t you say?