circus

a few weeks ago, my friend kasey called me. she had been given free tickets to the circus in memphis and invited me and my kiddos. i decided not to take tommy, as i knew he would never sit remotely still long enough for that.
so mark anthony, lacee, me, kasey, noah, and carli (one of lacee's bffs) headed out. we got there about 5 minutes after the start time, but that was ok b/c apparantly there was a misprint in the paper about the start time, so we were earlier than alot of people that came!
we stayed for the first half and thru the intermisson. the kids enjoyed it, the only bad part was there were too many human acts and not enough animal acts to keep my wild child interested. he did ride an elephant, which totally blew my mind because he did it all by himself, no one he knew rode it with him!!
after the circus we went to chucky cheese to eat and give the boys a chance to run off energy before the ride home. it was super packed, but a really nice chucky cheese. not just games, but tons of rides. mark anthony loved that part. lacee and carli and noah loved the games part the best. everyone but carli and the adults slept on the way back home. it was a great day with friends!!

yuck

today is saturday. lacee is at donnies for last night and most of today.
mark anthony woke his daddy up at 530 am, sick with a stomach virus. he has thrown up around 10 times by now, at 930am. mark is still down in his back, he is back in bed, and i am up with the boys. thankfully, so far mark anthony is the only one sick. my current job is keeping tommy from playing in the pukey garbage can right beside mark anthony at all times. lovely saturday, huh?

cost vs value

our childrens minister at church has begun forwarding us these neat parenting help emails. i love that. below is one that he sent this week.
i hope and pray that i always see the value of my children, rather than the cost. and that when the moments come that i am caught up in the cost (of course its gonna happen....we all get caught up in it from time to time. the lack of time to do this, to do that, the lack of money for this or that, the lack of sleep, the excess of gray hairs and stretch marks,...) that i am quick to remember that the value is greater and longer lasting than any cost.

• • • • •
Parenting Tip

February 23, 2009


Cost vs. Value


Do you focus on the "value" of your children, or do you spend most of your time considering how much they "cost?"

One woman had a table worth $600. She valued the table but decided to sell it and set the price at $400. A man came to purchase the table and liked it very much. He offered her $300. The woman explained to the man that the table was worth $600 and that she couldn't reduce the price any more. The woman felt as if she had reduced the price too much already.

The man thought about it and said, "Lady, we would both be happy if you would just change the price." The woman knew the man was right. She went back to the price tag and crossed out $400 and wrote $600. The man was shocked. The woman said, "The table is worth $600."

"But it costs so much."

The woman was focusing on the table's value; the man was looking at the cost.

Parents often do this with their children. Raising children has a high price tag that includes loss of sleep and fewer choices for your free time and money. You transport them from here to there and back here again. Children cost much more than parents ever imagined. If you focus too much on the cost, you miss the value. Parents who realize the value of their children conduct themselves differently and closeness is the result.

The man valued the table so he bought it. He took it home and put it in a special place. If anyone put a drink down on it, he quickly offered a coaster, wanting to protect that table. Why? He knew its value. It was worth a lot to him.

Children aren't possessions, they're treasures. Most parents don't realize what they're getting into when they bring that little bundle of cuteness home from the hospital. They may get irritated or lose some of the joy of parenting over the years. Part of the solution is to get your mind off the cost and onto the value of your children. They won't be around too long. When you recognize a child's value it's easier to show honor.


This parenting tip is taken from the book, Say Goodbye to Whining, Complaining, and Bad Attitudes, In You and Your Kids, by Dr. Scott Turansky and Joanne Miller, RN, BSN. This book is about practical ways that parents can teach honor and model it in relationships.




If this tip was sent to you by a friend and you'd like to continue to receive tips yourself, you can sign up at www.biblicalparenting.org.

whats the deal?

i am subbing today. they are watching a video. after watching it a couple times already, i am now here to blog.
in my first period class we got into the discussion of "why can a white guy call a black guy the N word and he gets mad, but if another black guy says it then its OK?" this is a discussion i imagine will carry on forever. it is one i gladly step into. i want to help people think more openmindedly. my ancestors werent so open minded. but that doesnt mean i dont get the chance to be.
i tell them that it is the same principal as this. let a fat girl say to her fat friend, "we cant fit thru this door together" and thats ok. but let a skinny girl say "you two cant fit thru that door together" and it on!
i dont find many people who will admit to understanding this concept. that its whats inside that counts, no matter whats on the outside. no matter the color of your skin, the color of your hair or eyes, the size of your body, the country you or your grandparents were born in.
i read this blog very often. i was so glad to see someone else displaying the same line of thinking. this post here made me happy. finally someone else who lives in savannah tn and gets it!

catching up

it has been so long since my last blog post. i am not really sure where to begin to catch up. we have just been playing and living and relaxing and working. very busy at all those things.
back in january our church hosted its 10th annual EU, or evangilism university. teens from all over the country come for the weekend. its more like a training convention than a youth rally. training them to share Gods word. we had 6 girls stay in our home friday night, 4 on saturday as 2 of them went back to freed that night. it was a wonderful weekend, and a big step for mark to let complete strangers stay in our home.
january also brought marks 39th birthday, my 31st, and his mothers. i am embarrassed to admit i am not sure which birthday she celebrated. she is still in the nursing home, which she now calls her home. we brought her to our house for thanksgiving and christmas. she seemed to enjoy it, but wasnt much on hanging around long.
february has brought valentines day, with mark anthony telling me, "mommy, you make my heart happy". it doesnt get any better than that! lacee and sam, are still calling each other boy and girl friend, and they exchanged gifts. she got him an under armour hat and a huge chocolate covered apple, he got her a heart shaped box of chocolates and a huge stuffed puppy dog which tommy tries to steal from her but she has somehow managed to sleep with it every night.
mark anthony isnt near as sick as he was last year. tommy is taking his turn at being the sick one. he has an appt in april and an appt in june at vanderbilt. one is with an ent and one is with an allergist. i am not sure which appt is which, lol. so long as we go to the right one on the right day i will be proud.
lacee is preparing to try out for a newly forming competative cheer squad at a local gymnastics facility. she is extrememly excited about that.
i have signed up to be a consultant for chezami childrens wear. www.chezami.com. i will have a busy 2 weeks in march conducting home shows. i wanted a way to earn a little extra income, and i enjoy the rush of direct sales companies. yet our busy schedule doesnt allow for much of that. chez ami only has 2 selling seasons, spring and fall. so i will have a wild 2 weeks in those 2 seasons, but i am looking forward to it.
tball is only available to 4 yr olds in savannah, but in neighboring crump, 3yr olds can play. mark anthony doesnt know it yet, but will be so thrilled to be able to play this summer!
mark anthony stayed the night a couple weeks ago with a friend, just down the road, his first ever sleep over. he has spent the night with his grandmother before, and with the smothermans last summer when lacee had surgery, but this was his first time spending the night with a friend just for the fun of it.
i have tons of pictures to go with these events, but i am at hchs subbing today. therefore my pictures are not with me. (its my break class...i'm not ignoring any students right now..haha)
i am subbing alot. as much as possible. i enjoy it, and we need the income.
mark has hurt his back. he has 4 buldging discs. 2 are above and 2 are below the place he had surgery on back in the early 90's. medication, shots, rest, heating pad.....nothing is providing much relief at all for him. he goes to see his back surgeon, but not until march 17. he is off work indefinately. he does have a small disability insurance policy at work, we arent sure yet what it pays. bless his heart, he is not one to stay at home, not one to sit around. i would be lieing if i said that i am not enjoying him doing the cooking and cleaning while i am at work...but i do hate that he is in pain. and no, i dont ask him to do the cooking and cleaning, but those are about the only things he is able to do. it keeps him busy and as much as i tell him he doesnt have to, he doesnt listen.
we are praying for a speedy recovery. for him to heal quickly. for his pain to be gone. for our finances to be ok. for us to still be able to take our children on the first beach trip in 6 years as we have planned. for mark to be able to play ball with the kids this summer. for him to be able to sleep in the bed and not in the recliner.
God is good. We know that he is in control. what a peace that brings. while i am scared and worried and concerned, i can honestly say that i do not have that huge weight on my shoulders i would have had previously. i am not going to let myself stress over this. i am gonna, as they say, "let go and let God". He will take care of us.

christmas 2008

christmas was wonderful for our family. mark works a cool shift at work now, he works 7 days straight and is off for 7 days straight. the 7 on really stink, but the 7 off are awesome! we were so glad that his 7 off fell christmas week. the kids were out of school, i of course was not subbing, and mark was home. it was just great!
last year was a hard christmas for us financially, and mark and i went overboard trying to make up for it this year. so did santa. i think that mark, santa, and i made wise choices in our purchases, though.
we know we are so blessed, to have our family, a home, great friends, and Jesus.
my mom stayed christmas eve night with us, a tradition we started years ago, so that they grandparents can see the kids enjoy santa the next morning. christmas eve evening, we open the presents from each other. i started this when lacee was little, to make christmas excitement last a little longer. then christmas morning we open what santa has brought.
christmas day i prepared a big meal. mark brought his mom home from the nursing home to enjoy the meal with us.
we spent the rest of the day at home, the rest of the week actually.
who could ask for more?

tough times

poor lacee. she has had a rough semester. i blogged about her birthday party and how the girls there gave her a rough time. she distanced herself from those that were the pickers that night for about a month, and things got better. she learned a little about standing up for herself.
lots of life issues i expect to deal with with my kids. walking, talking, potty training, loosing teeth (although this one is still gross to me..the wiggling and popping...ewww), fights with friends, puberty, homework issues, teacher issues, the talk, etc etc etc. yet monday night i found myself dealing with a situation i was totally unprepared for. lacee was equally unprepared.
a friend of hers that had been over a night or two the week before was staying her second night in a row at our house. a super sweet, well mannered likeable 10yr old girl. mark and i loved having her over. the boys enjoyed her too. the girls also invited another girl over for the night. this one hasnt been here as much, but has been one of lacee's friends for many years.
i took the girls to the movies, and my young friend sarah went with me so i wouldnt be the only adult sitting 3 rows behind the kids. after the movies the girls all came back to our house for the night. mark had to be at work at 545am, so we warned the girls that they must be super super quiet that night (hard, i know) so as not to wake him and that the next day when everyone was awake they could let 'er rip. they understood and agreed.
they were actually doing pretty good with the quiet part, sarah just warned them twice to ssshhhh, we were trying to keep it low. the second time sarah opened the door, lacee says "i'm changing!!!"
lacee then tells sarah, "they are trying to take a picture of me while i am changing!" and sure enough, sarah seen one of the girls with her cell phone out, holding it up in picture taking mode.
being only 19 and unsure of what to do, she came to me.
my first mistake..i sat there stunned for like a minute or two.
my second mistake..i went to the room, told the girls that i loved all three of them very much and that there would be no naked pictures of anyone taken at anytime, or no sexy pictures of anyone with clothes on. i made them promise me that the picture had not been sent to anyone and that it had been deleted.
my third mistake..i left the room. for like 5 minutes. the longer i sat in the living room the madder i got. i was shocked and scared and didnt know what to do. i have never had to send a child home from my house for misbehavior. i certainly was not expecting to deal with naked picture taking from 10yr olds!!
i called a friend of mine to ask what she would do. "have you taken their cell phones away from them?" OMG NO!!! what was i thinking!! i should have confiscated them immediately. i just slipped. i froze. i was UNPREPARED.
so i got off the phone with wendi and walked straight to the girls room. "give me all 3 of your cell phones and you two pack your things, you are going home."
the tears ensued immediately. please please no.
i called both moms, explained the situation, and asked them to come get their daughters and have a long talk with them. it was between 10:30 and 11pm at this time.
the girls came into the living room, sat on the couch. crying and begging me not to call their moms, to let them have their phones back, they were sorry, they didnt send it to anyone, it was deleted, they didnt mean it.
i began to talk with them. i told them that i loved all of them very much, that it wasnt because the pic was of lacee. but that pics like that are just wrong. i asked them what they thought when they saw people in magazines or books or on tv like that, did they think it was cool? i told them that if that pic had been sent to even just one person, that by the next day that pic would be all over the county and lacee would forever be known by that pic. i asked them how they what they would think if one of their friends had a pic of another of their friends like that? i asked them did they think it was cool? i asked them did they think their moms and dads would be proud of them for this? i asked them did they think God was proud of them for this? i told them that life was full of choices and one bad decision can have tons of horrible consequences. they have to learn to think things through. as they go to middle school next year it is only going to get harder. i told them that i wanted to believe them, that they were just playing around and did not think through the consequences of thier actions and did not do this to be mean spirited.
i dont know if i believe that or not.
after both girls were gone, i woke mark up. from an entirely too deep sleep, he didnt have much to say.
lacee and i talked for a long time. she is devastated. this is the way it happened. as lacee was changing from her clothes to her pj's and was in her bra and panties, one of the girls pulled her panties down and said, "take the picture". as lacee bent down to pull up her panties, the other girl snapped the picture. lacee said she saw the pic and it showed her legs and her bottom. the other two confirmed this was the way it happened earlier.
i honestly believe this account of it, and that lacee was not agging them on for pics of her that way. why? because back in aug a boy put his arm around her at school, she shoved him off, and was mortified!!! so i dont want to think that in 4 months she has went from arm on the shoulder is off limits to wanting to pose for playboy. i dont want to be the nieve mom who thinks her kids do no wrong. i know they do and will. i just dont think she is this bad right now. and i pray that she never is. i pray that the girls all learn from this lesson. i pray that the moms all learn from it too. i have learned from it.
i have learned to be way more strict on her friendships.
from now on, lacee's phone goes to bed with me at night, as well as the computer. if she has friends over with cell phones, they too will go with me at night. the next step if needed will be that she is no longer allowed to text and that she will only be allowed to talk on the phone with me or her daddy in the same room.
the next morning, through text messages with the camera holder, lacee learned that they had also tried to take another of her without her knowing. she is so mad, so hurt. she doesnt want to be friends with these girls anymore, and dreads going back to school to see them. this is from a child that wants to be friends with everyone no matter what and loves school even when her grades are bad.
i will also be requesting that lacee's seating arrangements during class and at lunch be adjusted.
i made calls to confirm that the pic had not been sent to anyone, and by now, friday, if it had been sent i am sure i would have heard about it. i am so very thankful that it had not been sent, and that we caught this situation before it got worse. i have been second guessing my every decision as a mom all week. my biggest fear in life is failing my children and/or screwing them up.
i asked lacee this week how she would feel if she walked into school next week and their were all her friends standing in the hallway with cell phones open, looking at that picture of her. she said she would want to move to memphis and never come back!
at random times throughout the week i have asked her to explain to me what happened. i have asked her to tell me why it was wrong. i have asked her to explain to me why she chooses to not be friends with these girls anymore. (even if she didnt choose that--she wouldnt be allowed to--but i am glad she is on the same page). she seems to grasp the concept as well as can be expected for a 10yr old girl.
i must admit that i am still in shock that this whole situation even came up. these girls are 10! TEN YEARS OLD! they are in the 5th grade. they come from good families. i was so unprepared to deal with this.