The Chasing Fireflies Podcast is for parents of young children. Its goal is to create family legacy moments that encourage children to communicate with confidence and view their world with a sense of wonder.
Let’s say you’re not a writer. But there are stories about your youth, parents and grandparents you want to share with your offspring. Could you create a small booklet of important family stories? Yes you could, and we will tell you how on our next Chasing Fireflies featuring author Dean Merrill.
Are there any cousin conversations coming up during this festive Christmas season? Could we remind you of the benefits to your children and grandchildren of using those occasions to collect a few more family heritage stories? Here is an example of how that type of conversation might sound.
What difference does it make if we keep the bond tight with extended family members? For many of us, our cousins and nieces and nephews, uncles and aunts and grandparents are spread across the country. Is it even practical to try to stay close? We tackle those questions in a Chasing Fireflies podcast called Stories Cousins Tell: Holiday Family Storytelling Ideas The holiday season is upon us, a time to reconnect with grandparents, brothers and sisters, aunts and uncles and the cousins. Why not take the occasion to use the audio record app on your smartphone and capture some family stories for future generations? Here are a few conversation starters you might ask the relatives: 1. How many stories do we know about how the couples in our extended family met? 2. Who remembers a special family reunion? 3. What are the top three values we share as an extended family and where did they come from? 4. How many generations are we from a family elder who immigrated to this country? 5. What have individual members of our extended family contributed to our understanding of how to live the best life?
We all know the whimsical holiday song that begins “on the first day of Christmas my true love gave to me a partridge in a pear tree.” We’ve never pictured French hens and maids a’ milking as ideal Christmas gifts. But the song always adds to the holiday cheer. Now we like it even more because Bonnie Johnson Fite has rewritten the lyrics to reflect the actual reason for the season. On this Chasing Fireflies Podcast you will hear the story of her beautiful children’s book The Twelve New Days of Christmas. "
When you’re a parent or grandparent, there is nothing quite like the look of Christmas morning amazement in your children’s eyes. But what if we could distribute a little of that intense anticipation and joy across the rest of December? That’s where we are headed on the next Chasing Fireflies Podcast.
Do I Have to Practice Piano Today? How do we strike a balance between a strong push in the back, knowing they will love the rewards, while also making their musical experience enjoyable? A legend in the field weighs in on this Chasing Fireflies podcast.
Join Chasing Fireflies Podcast contributor Gil Moegerle for Part 1 of Raising Confident Communicators. As Gil explains, helping our children develop conversational skills is the first step toward building the communication skills required of adults, relationally and professionally. And, while talking might come naturally to our kids, effectively connecting with others requires some coaching. We can help.
We invite you to join us in "purposeful practice" - activities that create confident communicators. The theme? Be a Friend!
Here comes a conversation with a woman who says, as a youngster, she was a poor student and the least gifted among her siblings. we refer Janet Stevens, who became the author and illustrator of best-selling children’s books that have received the Parents Choice Award, the Notable Children's Trade Book award, the Caldecott Honor book citation, among others. How we encourage the child whose gifts blossom late, next on the Chasing Fireflies Podcast.
Do you love those special holiday movies about heart-warming family experiences as much as we do? You know the type presented this time of year by Hallmark or the Lifetime Movie Network. You are about to hear about one such movie airing the day after Thanksgiving that should be on your must-watch list – Every Other Holiday. We talk to its award-winning screenwriter, Andrea Nasfell, on this Chasing Fireflies podcast.
Thanksgiving alert. Our newest H2L podcast contains a simple tip for great family storytelling that is one of the best suggestions we’ve heard. It is built around your upcoming Thanksgiving family gathering. Heritage2Legacy.com
The Heritage2Legacy Project: Identifying and preserving your family memories. Let’s say you have listened to our podcasts about the importance of capturing and retelling important family stories. And you agree – storytelling helps create a child’s sense of identity and can pass along key family values. But maybe this is a painful subject for you because the story of your childhood contains few positive memories you want to tell your children and grandchildren. What then? Allow Dr. David Gyertson to tell you his story."
Are you identifying and preserving your family memories? A family's story keeper seems to remember in delightful detail, key moments in their clan's history and they tell cherished tales again and again without losing our interest. On this edition of Chasing Fireflies you will hear the epic tale of one such keeper.
The Heritage2Legacy Project: Identifying and preserving your family memories. What were your Mom and Dad’s favorite parenting sayings? You know, the ones that sounded like, “Put that stick down or you’ll poke your eye out.” We’ve assembled a few of our favorites for this edition of the H2L podcast. Join us, and stop crossing your eyes or they’ll stay that way. Heritage2Legacy.com
“The lack of emotional security of our American young people is due, I believe, to their isolation from the larger family unit. No two people – no mere father and mother – as I have often said, are enough to provide emotional security for a child. He needs to feel himself one in a world of kinfolk, persons of variety in age and temperament, and yet allied to himself by an indissoluble bond which he cannot break if he could, for nature has welded him into it before he was born.” – Pearl S. Buck This H2L memory? Cherished Family Reunion Memories.
Our new Heritage2Legacy short story is a two-fer. We tell a story in tribute to Billy Graham’s historic ministry. And we suggest one of your family tales deserves the label – greatest of all. Two stories for the price of one (free).
The Heritage2Legacy Project: Identifying and preserving your family memories. Our newest Heritage2Legacy short story is a tale of a common family experience – childhood fantasies of growing up and becoming…whatever. We describe a children’s book on the subject about superstar Michael Jordan, then illustrate how you could tell related family stories. Childhood dreams coming true, or not, this H2L podcast.
The Heritage2Legacy Project: Identifying and preserving your family memories. Tis the season for shimmering Christmas trees and lustrous decorations, colorfully wrapped gifts and joyous family reunions. Our next Heritage2Legacy short story is about several of our reunions, many unapologetically quirky. Join us for Family Holiday Gatherings, Surprises, and Approved Lying. Do you have a Christmas memory that involves a surprise?
The Heritage2Legacy Project: Identifying and preserving your family memories. Our next Heritage2Legacy short story takes us back to our small childhood home in Western PA, to cold wintry evenings and to four kids opening the front door to the smell of mother’s baking fresh out of the oven. And there are recipes. Homemade Crusty Bread and Apple Butter, next at H2L.
The Heritage2Legacy Project: Identifying and preserving your family memories. Our new Heritage2Legacy short tale is full of family faith stories – a barren couple who bore four children, a father of littles who lost his job on a Friday and went back to work on Monday. A hearty dose of inspiration - on this H2L podcast.
The Heritage2Legacy Project: Identifying and preserving your family memories. Our next Heritage2Legacy short story calls out a favorite childhood book and an enchanting childhood experience. Lions and wardrobes and attics, next at Heritage2Legacy.com
The Heritage2Legacy Project: Identifying and preserving your family memories. In this edition of our Heritage2Legacy cherished family stories series, we encourage you to think of a favorite teacher. This Heritage2Legacy short story calls out a favorite childhood teacher and one particular classroom skill she displayed that became one of our most important lessons learned. My First Favorite Teacher, next at Heritage2Legacy.com. We hope you enjoy this edition of Chasing Fireflies: H2L. Gil Moegerle
The Heritage2Legacy Project: Identifying and preserving your family memories. In this edition of our Heritage2Legacy cherished family stories series, we encourage you to think of your family vacations. By today’s standards, my three siblings and I grew up in a strict, old-school, by-the-book family setting. And we loved it. Our parents were flexible about some things and not so much about others. That was one reason the authoritarian stuff never seemed to be a problem. An example of this flexibility we saw mixed in with the strickness? Our annual family vacation broke all the rules. We hope you enjoy this edition of Chasing Fireflies: H2L. Gil Moegerle
The Heritage2Legacy Project: Identifying and preserving your family memories. In this edition of our Heritage2Legacy cherished family stories series, we encourage you to think of a baseball story. Did you play baseball? Did you go to baseball games; to spring training? Who was your favorite team? Check out the page tab, Heritage2Legacy, on our website for all the information you need to join us in creating legacy stories for the next generation. FirefliesBlog.com
The Heritage2Legacy Project: Identifying and preserving your family memories. In this edition of our Heritage2Legacy cherished family stories series, we encourage you to think of treasured family pets (real & unreal). Check out the page tab, Heritage2Legacy, on our website for all the information you need to join us in creating legacy stories for the next generation in your family. FirefliesBlog.com
The Heritage2Legacy Project: Identifying and preserving your family memories. In this edition of our Heritage2Legacy cherished family stories series, we give you examples Christmas memories. Check out the page tab, Heritage2Legacy, on our website for all the information you need to join us in creating legacy stories for the next generation in your family. FirefliesBlog.com
The Heritage2Legacy Project: Identifying and preserving your family memories. In this edition of our Heritage2Legacy cherished family stories series, we give you examples Christmas memories. Check out the page tab, Heritage2Legacy, on our website for all the information you need to join us in creating legacy stories for the next generation in your family. FirefliesBlog.com
We are calling these new tools Heritage2Legacy because stories are a way to influence future generations. Storytelling helps take the family heritage given to you, or which you began, and pushes that heritage forward toward legacy. We wanted to help make it easier for your family to create and preserve these favorite stories. Examples of our new H2L resources include a theme, a featured book prompt, and an example of a print and audio memory based on the theme and/or book. Simply write down or record one simple memory – a moment. You can do it!
The Heritage2Legacy Project: Identifying and preserving your family memories. In this edition of our Heritage2Legacy cherished family stories series, we give you examples of two stories your children and grandchildren will love to hear from you. What was your parent's first job and what was yours? Check out the page tab, Heritage2Legacy, on our website for all the information you need to join us in creating legacy stories for the next generation in your family. FirefliesBlog.com
The Heritage2Legacy Project: Identifying and preserving your family memories. For most of us, Thanksgiving is one of those special family legacy moments. And planning our next Thanksgiving is another example of how we all try to take the family heritage given us and try every year to push it forward toward family legacy. Our new Heritage2Legacy project provides you with ideas for capturing and preserving for generations to come these special family moments. Listen as Gil Moegerle attempts to capture for his grandchildren his childhood Thanksgiving.
The Heritage2Legacy Project: Identifying and preserving your family memories. Have you ever spread homemade apple butter across a slice of bread just out of the oven on a brisk fall morning? Now that's an experience you can't buy at a store. Here is the story of an extended family tradition - coming together to make apple butter in granddad's basement.
The Heritage2Legacy Project Identifying, Publishing, Preserving your family memories Whether it means chasing fireflies on a summer evening, enjoying a fire in the fireplace, or sharing the porch swing and small talk with your grandparent, each of us has a vision of home. Memories are what create our definition of home and those memories are what we desire to identify, publish, and preserve for the next generation. In this post, Gil shares a memory from his childhood. It involves his grandfather, a printing press, and a little magic. Join us at FirefliesBlog.com this year as we prompt you to remember 10 moments from your past, package them with 10 delightful children’s books, and create a Legacy Gift for someone you love. Book: Library Lion by Michelle Knudsen Tell a story about your local library, a favorite book, someone who read to you, anything having to do with books - the printed word. CLICK HERE for the Love, Button Post 1/12
Imagine teenage girls becoming the best of friends in high school, then that special bond lasting 20 years. What difference can such friendships make when a young woman encounters life’s joys and heartbreaks? This is part 2 of their story.
Do you remember the childhood song, "Make new friends but keep the old; one is silver and the other's gold"? Listen to the story of six young girls becoming the best of friends in middle school, and then that special bond lasting 20 years. You’ll hear part 1 of their story on this Chasing Fireflies Podcast.
The Fireflies team loves Humphrey the camel and his funny, meaningful Christmas book adventure. So we wanted you to meet his creator Carol Heyer, a leading children’s book author and illustrator. Carol introduces us to this wise men’s grumpy ride and then provides practical tips for spotting and nourishing creativity in our children.
What is it like to be twenty- or thirty-something and trying to build a lifelong marriage when your parents couldn’t? How does it feel to begin parenting when you have a broken relationship with your own parents? In this new Chasing Fireflies Podcast we talk about these challenging family issues with Mike Glenn, a Nashville pastor who specializes in helping Millennials build successful homes.
Listen to the return podcast visit of motion picture screenwriter Andrea Nasfell who talks about the sometimes surprising response to her family comedy about three stressed-out young mothers – Mom’s Night Out.
Talking to Our Children about Talking to God What is the best way to introduce our children to prayer? This year we plan to ask that question of several spiritual development specialists because passing along an exciting prayer life is one of a parent’s greatest contributions. The first of these conversations is ready for your listening enjoyment. It features Mark Labberton, a husband, father and pastor who was recently named president of Fuller Theological Seminary. Listen as Mark explains how he and his wife raised two boys to view talking to God as a natural part of their day.
It’s commencement season. Our children are taking the next step in their school experience. For some, that step is a big one…to first grade, or junior or senior high school or maybe even bigger…off to college. So we thought you might find it interesting to hear the head of a university talk about whether American children are prepared for college and independence. Dr. Sandy Gray is the president of Asbury University outside Lexington, KY. She spends her days around young people at that critical turning period from youth to adulthood. Listen to our newest podcast – Preparing Your Child to Launch – to hear Dr. Gray’s top tips for helping your child liftoff well.
Part two of our special conversation with the screenwriter of the Mother’s Day movie Mom’s Night Out - Andrea Nasfell – is now available. This time we talk to this successful creative writer about how we spot creative potential in our children and what to do when we see it. At the end of the conversation we return to movie making as Andrea explains exactly how each of us can directly influence the types of motion pictures Hollywood produces. Visit us at FirefliesBlog.com
There is a great new family movie comedy coming for Mother’s Day – Mom’s Night Out. And the Chasing Fireflies Podcast has recorded for you a special conversation with the film’s screenwriter – Andrea Nasfell. Listen to this dream-come-true story of a little girl who loved making up stories who is now the writer of a national release feature motion picture. Then plan a date night or girls outing to see a story that will make you feel good about the beautiful mess we call parenting.
As a father of four boys and a 25-year veteran of school administration, Larry understands the busyness of daily life—how days merge into weeks as hurried lifestyles spin out of control, leaving us wondering how our toddlers became teenagers. Dr. Taylor just authored a book, Running with the Horses, that introduces you to a simple, biblically-based plan for raising servant leaders for Christ. Whether your child is 18 months or 18 years old, this book will guide you through the process of preparation for the “race” that awaits him in this world. Join Gil and Larry as they discuss just how to have children grow up and become servant leaders.
Mary Kline shares her passion for reading aloud to children. Why must we read aloud to our children? Why is it so important for children to develop a sense of wonder? You will be inspired as you enjoy this delightful conversation between master storyteller Mary Kline and Gil Moegerle. Be sure to listen to our Fireflies' GLOW series, where Mary Kline, Deni Corbett, Gil Moegerle, and special guest storytellers share their favorite read aloud selections.
Linda Werner stops by our Chasing Fireflies Podcast for a conversation about three life-changing passions – family, homeschooling and raising thanksgiving children. Werner heads the women’s ministry Legacy Principles and, along with her husband Jim, leads the large homeschooling organization Circle Christian School supporting Central Florida families. In her second conversation with Gil Moegerle, Linda shares how to raise Thanksgiving children.
Linda Werner stops by our Chasing Fireflies Podcast for a conversation about three life-changing passions – family, homeschooling and raising thanksgiving children. Werner heads the women’s ministry Legacy Principles and, along with her husband Jim, leads the large homeschooling organization Circle Christian School supporting Central Florida families.
How can we encourage a sense of artistic wonder and creativity in our young children? And how would we know if our child has been given a special artistic gift? Listen to this new Chasing Fireflies podcast as we put these questions to award-winning children’s book illustrator Ron Mazellan.
Join Chasing Fireflies Podcast contributor Gil Moegerle for Part 1 of Raising Confident Communicators. As Gil explains, helping our children develop conversational skills is the first step toward building the communication skills required of adults, relationally and professionally. And, while talking might come naturally to our kids, effectively connecting with others requires some coaching. We can help.
Gil Moegerle discusses with Steve Brown, what it means to create family legacy moments that encourage children to communicate with confidence and view the world with a sense of wonder.
Meet Amanda Hampton, the newest member of the FirefliesBlog.com team. Her focus in the coming months will be inspiring parents to intentionally develop a heart of gratitude in their children. Listen as she shares with Gil Moegerle, her own journey to teach her five children to live a life of gratitude.
Gil and Deni discuss the importance of providing oral language experiences for young children, and explain the Fireflies' "Tell Me a Story" Box. Listen as Deni and 5-year-old Davis share a "Tell Me a Story" moment. http://firefliesblog.com/2013/03/27/create-tell-me-story-box/
Chasing Fireflies is a series of podcasts that expand on thoughts and ideas expressed on The Fireflies Blog. [FirefliesBlog.com] In our first episode, we begin the discussion of why we decided to create a blog and what beliefs inspired us to want to "create family legacy moments that encourage children to communicate with confidence and view the world with a sense of wonder." Deni Corbett & Gil Moegerle
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