Enjoying a happy Number 4

Some 7 years ago, my wife and I received the news that she was pregnant with our 4th child. The initial mixed feelings - between joy and apprehension about whether we can cope with one more - soon gave way to an expectancy and resolution: We want to make this a happy child! The stress on happiness was against the backdrop then of many stresses that we could see our first 3 children endured - constantly under high stress state of meeting academic and behavioral standards. A typical day then for our children was studies-at-school and homework-at-home. The weekends were not spared from the presence of additional homework. It did not help that when the children were not self-motivated, we felt the need to remind them to work hard, which usually kick started cycles of scold-sour mood-poor work-more scolding-unhappiness...We knew that our monitoring (or nagging) breeds a mood of negativeness and unhappiness for everyone; yet we could not leave them alone in their ill-discipline and lack of concentration in their studies. We were convinced we had to break this unhappiness trap for our no. 4. We think the key was in shifting the focus from negativeness (constant scolding and corrections) to positiveness (enjoying him and surround him with warmth/laughter). This, of course, did not mean an abandonment of one for the others; it was a case of rebalancing of emphasis. For the last 6 years, the time spent with him was with the main view of enjoying him, with training in behavior and character done as positive as we could. We also thought that, for our first three children, we were too absorbed in the work of parenting - the teaching, monitoring, correction, and disciplining - that we had forgotten to enjoy the time we spent with them. For them, the years seemed to roll by so quickly that, before we knew it,their childhood was over in a jiffy. For the no.4 then, we were intend to enjoy his childhood before we live to regret again. [thankfully, we had another chance to 'right the wrong'] I am looking at him now as I write. He is indeed a happy child. We thank God for that. We hope he will look back at his childhood with many fond memories. Just a while ago, he picked a twig and wrote some words on the playground sandpit, "Seth loves my family". We know full well the challenges that may shake this happy state when he goes to school in half a year's time. But for now, we savour a moment of enjoyment - a treasure from God.