As with life things can become very roller coaster like and it doesn't allow for much thought processing via the internet since often you find yourself in a knee jerk do it now mode.
Reconnecting with old friends, loosing a couple too, paying bills, daily grind stuff, extended family stuff...it all adds up sometimes. There's not much left for the frivolity of mind dumping on the computer.
Yet birthdays still happen:
My son's 16th birthday cake
Kids grow up and do amazing things:
My eldest daughter modeling on a local tv show.
Life keeps on keeping on. Since my own father passed away a little over 8 ago when I was still in my 20's I feel cheated. I know from talking with my other friends who also lost their parents at a young age, it's a common to feel cheated. You didn't get enough time, you didn't get to share big life experiences with them. It can make you long for their presence and do the "I wishes".
There's not much you can do when you are at a loss like that except fill your heart with good thoughts of them and go on. On the flip side, as a parent you can invest that quality time with your kids. Spend as much time as you can with them because life flies by and you don't want your kids to ever say "I wish you would've spent more time with me." They can get over not owning an Xbox because there will be another thing just like it down the road, but never will be more time to spend during their childhood.
I'm not the most successful gal in my business world. I could be more assertive with that if I wanted. I could be making more money and buying more cool stuff, but that takes away from my time with my kids. I'll be honest, this year its really setting in how fast the time flies by. I'm in the months count down mode to when my oldest will be packing up and moving out. That's it. That's all I get. Even if she has to come back home and live with me as many of us had to do, she'll be different.
Thoughts like that come up especially when you see horrible things in the news. It urges you to use your time wisely, you never know what will happen next.
Man, that sounds so 1950's. But it is true. I was quite the shithead of a teenager.
I'm not even sure where I should begin this story actually.
In a daily setting today, I look like any suburban mom (younger and more stylish than average of course). I go to my children's school functions, chit chat with my neighbors and kids' parents when I run into them in my idyllic town. I think I am pretty normal. My kids have been pretty normal so far too.
I did walk a long road to get here.
I was raised by my father who was on the older side from when I was 9 on up. I did have a few stepmothers, so my home life was pretty strange at times with those ladies. At one point my niece who is only 4 years younger than me lived with my dad & I. So I got to experience what it was like to be an older sibling in away. Did I mention that I am the baby of 6 or 3 depending on which parent we're discussing. I'm not sure if that is applicable to this post but I know many live by the birth order train of thought so there it is.
Thea, her cousin & two friends 1994
With a crazy home life any kid starts to bond with their friends who had similar situations at their homes. Granted I was born and raised in a military town on an island with not a whole lot to do so I'm sure that added fuel to my troublemaking fire. But I had and still have some close friends who were little shits too.
Without going into much detail I was in juvenile detention a couple times, forced to go to anger management classes, expelled from school and had many hours of community service work for various punishments. I deserved all my punishments if not more.
I wanted to put this out there because I feel that it is important to know that I have a history of not being perfect. When I publish advice on teenagers I feel as if I am relating to myself who was a handful as a teen and also relating to my own teenagers today. I have been living a trial and error life.
On all the mom blogs out there I can't say that I've read anything where a mom openly admits being a juvenile delinquent. No perfect picture painting here, I'm honest about who I was and am today.
So far that's working out for me and my kids. As you can imagine it takes a lot to pull some shit past me.
So there it is, judge me or commiserate. I know I wasn't the only bad kid out there :)
So if you are like me you've made it this far into motherhood that you can just smell a lie wafting in the air when a child of yours puts it out into the universe. Its mother's intuition.
Being a mother is having a type of an intimate relationship. Its personal, intense, fulfilling and at times draining. But through it all you learn intimate details of each other and really *know* them well.
As parents you teach your kids right from wrong, how to write their name, wipe their butts and a plethora of other things to raise them up to be a well adjusted human being.
We even teach them how to lie.
Now don't argue with me on this, you know I am right.
Say Friday night your mom calls and you are busy, you don't want to talk to her you say something like "Tell her I'm in the shower!" As small as that is it's a lie and you taught it to your kid.
As adults we understand the difference (well most of us and the rest we hope aren't breeding) of various types of lies. Kids don't however and lying is apart of normal development. If you think back to being a young kid, you probably broke or lost something of your parents' and lied about it so you wouldn't get into trouble. Its a gut reaction to CYA (cover your ass). We by nature are protective of ourselves and the ones we love. As we grow we learn how to cope with the ramifications of our actions and accept responsibility for them. At least that is the ideal. Until then we test our boundaries by telling lies in times of "trouble" or "danger" to prevent scolding or a form a hurt.
One of my children has been on a lying streak lately. I won't disclose which child it is because my children and their friends know of this blog. Lucky for me I am truly a horrible liar so thus I have produced horrible liars. So for me this little game of guess the lie has been somewhat easy.
One starts to cry immediately, another tilts their head downward, the other two get all shifty eyed.
They will never be lawyers.
Even though it is "easy" it does take effort on my part to discipline and talk about it. I mention this because I can't even tell you how many parents I have come in encounter with who allow their children to lie because they don't want to deal with it. Yes, I am totally judging them. Lies say something about the person who is telling it, even the small ones. Shielding pain, insecurities, lack of knowledge & embarrassment. You don't know what it is unless you are upfront and talk about it. Wouldn't you want your kid to tell you that someone has been shoving them into a locker at school, or that their friends were pressuring them to use meth or that they think they are pregnant? You'd totally want to be in the know, so you can help if serious situations like that were happening.
Next time you find a box of cereal empty in the cupboard and are lied to about who or why it was left there, take a minute and tell the kid that they don't have to lie about dumb shit. Telling lies is a really bad habit to have. Ask any woman who has been hurt, she'll tell you all about it for an extreme example.
I would like to say that I've had yelling fits at my kids for lies told to me, I am human. I definitely don't know everything either but I do know that communicating and interacting with your kids for the good and the bad makes all the difference to them.
I'm assuming you've all seen the incredibly sweet scene of The Holiday I pasted above.
"I used only the good notes."
What's a girl got to do to get a guy to say that to her? I just love that scene.
Music can simply melt you into pieces. Good and bad pieces of course.
Some songs can take you to a place you once lived, a time with good friends that happened decades ago and even bad times that you wish you could forget.
Yes, I am that girl that fell hard for a guy who played music and was in band. I thought I'd get that info out of the way. So those of you who have had bad experiences with musicians you can just quit reading now.
Music is not only a wonderfully expressive art but it is a language as well. There are about a million studies and reports for the benefits of kids playing music. They learn a skill not everyone has, they learn to read music and how to keep a beat/rhythm. Most importantly they learn how to express themselves in a new way.
My youngest child (blonde ponytail) playing the violin at a concert recently.
I did "make" all four of my children take orchestra. I know some of you are totally cringing at the idea of screeching strings filling the air in your homes, but honestly it hasn't been so bad.
A lot of schools now cut the music and arts programs due to funding. I think that is really sad because as with life in general you should have hard work to do yet balanced out with fun stuff like music & art. The one huge noticeable benefit that my kids seemed to have received from all the music lessons they've had, is that they are all excellent in math. Each one of them has different levels of talent with music but they all know the language of music. My youngest who has only been playing for a few months took it upon herself to research the theme song to Zelda and taught herself how to play it. She didn't ask for help, she just researched it out of curiosity. That really made me smile and feel proud. Curiosity like that is really admirable.
Varieties of music fill the rooms of my house daily. My teenagers, one in particular likes to make music and gets serious about classifications of genres and styles. It's really like a bad sitcom around here somedays, but they have learned to appreciate sounds and music. Sure some of it is the crap you'd hear if you turned on the radio but they are teenagers. We all assault our parent's ears with horrible music from our teenage years, it's a rite of passage.
I won't lie to you and tell you music lessons even the school classes aren't expensive. They are. I about shit myself when I saw how much a violin was. You can buy instruments used, lease them and some schools offer financial aid or other loaning programs for them. Choir is beneficial as well because you learn to read music there too. With the popularity of Glee many schools have brought those back too.
I do get asked often about my kid's music classes because its now viewed as something "fancy", maybe it is but my kids have really benefited from it and it does show in other areas of their studies. I feel like the expense has been worth it. We also have passed down instruments so that was really cost effective for us.
Mom to mom here promise me that if your kid comes home with a flyer for a music program at school promise me you'll take it seriously. It's not about raising little rock stars but allowing your child to learn a new language and explore life through sound.
C'mon you know on somedays you walk around with a theme song of the day in your head! At the very least you have sweet car solo singing sessions. It feels good right? Music is awesome.
