Where is God?

It occurs to me that we spend an enormous amount of time and energy trying to get our children to see that God is everywhere and He cares for us. You know those "teachable moments" we all look for? Well, they exist so we can talk to our children about our big God who cares for us and takes care of us.

So, what about the hurricane? I don't know about you but our roof blew off. Not all of it but enough to make a huge mess in our house that we have to deal with and pay for (blame the huge deductible). We went without power for a week and the food in our fridge was spoiled. The storm made a mess and when I look at the news coverage I think we made off pretty well. Many people are effectively homeless because of Ike. So, where is God in all of this? Where is His loving care now?

We grownups know that God is still here. Hurricanes aren't His doing or His plan. They are a force of nature that is capricious and unpredictable. They can make one family homeless while leaving another with nothing more than spoiled food. We grownups understand that God's love and care is still ours. We know He is faithful. We know that these difficult times will fade but God's love and care never do.

It's possible that your children don't know these things.

Now would be a good time to tell them.

Kathy

Hurricanes can slow you down and speed you up

Interesting, isn't it, how something can slow you down and speed you up at the same time? Like most of the Houston area we were affected by Hurricane Ike. A good bit of our roof flew off and we had some water damage. Let me tell you, it's pretty startling to look up at your roof and see plywood. It's just as amazing to realize that your yard is littered with the shingles that used to cover that plywood. Fortunately for us, the damage done to our house was in rooms where no one lives during the school year. Sorry college boys, you'll have to stay where you are for a while till we get the mess cleaned up.

So the slowing down part....we spent a week without power. That means flashlights at night, no tv and a refrigerator full of food slowly going bad. After 4 days I finally quit turning on the light every time I went in my closet but I never quit looking at the oven to check the time. For seven days, every time I walked through my kitchen I looked at the oven expecting to see the time. I didn't realize I was so obsessed with the time of day. We watched some movies on my daughters portable DVD player, we played cards and monopoly, we napped....a lot. There was a sense of languidness about the days.

Which isn't to say we weren't busy and that is the "speed you up" part. For me, Hurricane Ike was a procrastination buster. I am a procrastinator, I admit it. I don't really get moved to action until there is some stressor in place. For several weeks I have been putting off cleaning up the boys rooms (organizing, putting away, yeah, they are not the cleanest of people....wonder where they get that from?) and cleaning out my fridge (maybe that's where they get it from). Also, their bathroom needed some serious attention. These things had been way down on my list of things to do...or the "Procrastination List" as we affectionately call it. Ike got me moving on all of those things. The boys rooms are now completely empty and the carpet is out. One could eat off of their bathroom floor and the refrigerator is looking new again. Things I may never have accomplished are well on their way due to Ike.

My brother says, "Fortune never comes with both hands full" and I can't decide how that really applies here but it seems to fit. My sister said, "So your carpet got wet and will have to be replaced? That's not a bad thing...I've seen your carpet." That fits too.

Kathy

Time really does fly

It's been four days since my last post but it seems like 20 minutes. Time really does fly whether or not you are having fun. It is that notion I wish to address.

I remember with vivid clarity each of the days my children were born. There are four of them and they were born a while back so it is amazing to me that those days are burned in my memory. I have an especially clear memory of driving to the hospital to deliver Adam and thinking, "oh my, I've waited too late" as an especially painful contraction gripped me. I remember that my water broke with Taylor and Leah. His as I sat on the toilet in the middle of the night and hers as I sat on the bed after getting up for the toilet in the middle of the night. Ryan's was an especially frightening delivery due to a prolapsed cord and a heartbeat that briefly disappeared.

What does any of this have to do with time flying? Well, I'll tell you. Time slows and, in fact, seems to stand perfectly still when momentous events are happening. There is often clarity of memory and emotion as these events occur that stick with you for a lifetime. The rest is mundane and forgettable. Barely causing a blip in the synapses of our brains before our brains move on to the next forgettable event.

I wish that I had paid more attention to the mundane. I wish that I had considered more events in my life "momentous" for in reality life is made of small moments that are precious. Babies become small children and then become young adults so fast it will make your head spin. Three of my children are now in college and live away from my home. I'm trying very hard to enjoy each moment with the child I have left but soon she too will be gone from me. It is the natural progression of parenting and anything less than that is a sadness. Nonetheless, I would like for time to slow down a bit. I don't want to look at the calendar and realize many days have passed and so have opportunities to enjoy those days.

So, since time flies I wish for an awareness of how precious is the time I have and a chance to fully enjoy all the blessings God has given. For that, it is never too late.

Kathy

Whiners

Did you ever see the movie "The Kid" with Bruce Willis? In the movie, Bruce Willis uses a phrase when people cry or whine that strikes me as humorous. He says "Wah, wah, let me call you a wambulance." You have to say this in a whiny voice and imaging Bruce saying it. Okay, maybe it's not that funny but it makes me smile.

These are things parents think about. How to make my kid stop that infernal whining. I saw a child today have an entire conversation with her mother, all in "whine". The mother kept talking to her like it was an okay thing that her daughter was speaking in that high pitched, sing-song complaining voice. Mom kept trying to reason with her and daughter kept whining. It was amazing to see (and hear).

What's a parent to do? My sister likes to politely say, "Oh, how sad, but I don't understand whine". This is pretty effective for her. The point is that you must do something to change the behavior. Taking action on or even listening to the whining encourages this behavior. So, if you like to hear whining, then keep on listening. If you would like to stop the behavior, you must take proactive steps such as not listening (and telling your child you are not listening) and rewarding non-whining by listening and responding positively.

Take note, if you don't take steps to stop the whining when they are young, you will soon be living with a whiny teenager. Who'll need a "wambulance" then?
Kathy

Brief thought

It's Sunday and posts will be brief due to the workload Sunday brings. I have only one thing to say based on observations at church this morning and it is this - the majority of childish misbehavior occurs because parents do not pay attention.

You must be watching to catch them in the act of misbehaving. Then you must address the misbehavior and demand better behavior. The fat lady hasn't actually sung until you can positively identify good behavior as a result of your intervention. If you don't continue to pay attention to see that good behavior follows, then you are simply training them to ignore you. You do that at your peril, for you cannot afford to be ignored when they are teenagers.

Trust me on that one.

Kathy

Movie for Kids?

What exactly does PG-13 mean and does it really mean anything to most parents? We went to see The Dark Knight tonight and there were several small children in the theatre. It really isn't a movie small children should see. It is dark (well, duh!), exceedingly violent and intense. People die in gruesome ways. Small children are put in great peril. Good guys become corrupt or appear corrupt. I was at turns frightened and confused. Imagine how a child under the age of about 13 might feel.

Young children with developing brains are unable to distinguish between fantasy and reality. To a four year old, Batman is as real as Cinderella who is as real as the President of the United States. They are not abstract thinkers and are unable to use concepts so as to make and understand generalizations (such as anything I see on a movie screen isn't real). In other words, youngsters don't see violence and know that a filmmaker paid actors to act. They see a woman being blown up and they believe a woman was blown up. These are images a small child is unable to adequately understand.

If you have an older child this might be a good movie to watch and discuss with them. Concepts such as good vs. evil; the appearance of evil vs. the substance of evil; doing the right thing even though it is the hard thing; self-sacrifice; and with the price of gasoline these days how on earth did the Joker manage to gather hundreds of barrels of diesel fuel to blow up all the stuff he blew up. Obviously, another topic of conversation with older children is the sad and wasteful death of Heath Ledger who played the Joker. Honestly, you can never have too many conversations about the dangers of mixing drugs and alcohol.

It is the job of a parent to protect their child and not enough people do that. There are some good websites out there for parents to check out movies before they take their children. I like www.kids-in-mind.com or www.parentpreviews.com Both of these sites are unemotional and straightforward in their approach without too many spoilers to get in the way.

So, did we like the movie? There were several plot holes that bugged but Heath Ledger was amazing (spotlighting his sad, sad death). I was upset a major character died, happy he didn't and upset again when another major character really did die. Morgan Freeman and Michael Caine were perfect. All in all I guess I would say that I did like the movie but I would have liked it better if I hadn't been distracted by wondering how the children in the theatre were faring.

Kathy

Beginnings

People tell me I should blog.....my first thought is "don't should on me" but they are probably right. Blogging is a way to share. Share your thoughts, share some dreams and really share a bit of yourself.

What do I have to share? Well, mostly some thoughts on how to raise children and not lose your mind. Having given birth to four children in 6 years, raised them through the horrendous middle school years, and sent three off to college I think I'm still sane (but most insane people think they're sane, so I'm not really certain of that).

There is no doubt that raising children is the single most difficult and rewarding thing you will ever do. Getting pregnant was hard for us but giving birth was easy. Potty training was hard but teaching them to drive was easy. It is a collosal understatement to say that sending them to college is hard but it's just as much an understatement to say that loving them is easy. There are few people in this world I would truly die for but my four kids are on that list. They are at the same time my biggest treasure, my largest source of pride and my greatest source of worry.

So, this blog will be about raising them. My experiences don't always translate to yours but maybe some of my musings will help you as your walk along the road with your children.
Kathy