If I could put my kids in a bubble to protect them from this world, I would. I am sure most moms would agree with me. There are so many scary things in this world that we live in from abductions to murder to cancer to teenage pregnancies, it just feels like there is no way to raise children nowadays and keep them protected. I pray that I do a good job, but sometimes I wonder.....
I have noticed lately that there is literally no way of keeping my girls from growing up too fast. They already think about boys more than I ever did at that age, they learn cuss words at school. I will say that sometimes I have to laugh a little like when they asked me if they were allowed to say the "S" word, and I calmly ask them what word they were referring to and they respond (as if I obviously should have known) with "shutup". Haha. Probably 90% of the bad influence in their life is from TV. Now, they know what they are allowed to watch and what they aren't. They know how to look at the rating for the show to see if it is for them, but I have noticed that some stuff with a child rating, is still not great. Now they have never been kids that just spend hours in front of the tv, but they have started doing it a lot more recently. I think this is in part because we have been living at my moms house, which is on the golf course, and it is DANGEROUS outside. If you play outside too much, you run the risk of getting hit with a golf ball! lol, not to mention, there's just not much to do outside here, no kids their age really.
Since we are moving this weekend (YAY!!), I have decided that it is a fresh start in so many ways and I want to take advantage of it. Here are a few of my plans:
1. NO MORE CABLE. For now anyways. I want the girls to get out and play, especially since warmer weather is finally here. The new apartment complex has tons of kids around, they have a great place to store their bikes so they have easy access getting them in and out. The complex is gated so kids pretty much can go off and explore on their own and I don't have to worrry too much besides the occassional check ins. I want them to read more, use their imagination, stop telling me "we're bored and have nothing to do" every five seconds. I am not banning tv for good in our home. We will still watch movies, and I can get some kids shows on DVD so that they have entire seasons to watch on rainy days. I am not promising we will last forever on this new plan, in fact, next week I might be calling up Comcast, not able to take it anymore! I think it will be more difficult for me than it will the girls. I have my regular shows that I am very use to having DVR'd to watch at my disposal, but I read a lot and I want to start exercising more, and spending more qualitity time with the girls, so I'm gonna see how this works......
2. FAMILY DINNER AT THE TABLE. The girls and I do sit and have dinner together, the problem is that it usually happens at a table at mcdonalds or some other place. lol. This is gonna be really tough for us to do since we have softball, so we don't get home til really late pretty often. But when we get the chance, I want us to have dinner at the table. The girls need HELP with their table manners, and this will help us work on it. And since they won't have a tv to run off to, this will be a little easier to do.
3. DISCIPLINE. And lots of it. Enough said.
4. READING. I feel like I don't encourage my kids to read enough. If you know me, you know that I am a bookworm. I always have a list of books lined up to read, I read on my breaks at work, I read before I go to bed at night, I LOVE TO READ. Kate and Alex don't just love it. They almost don't want to sit still long enough to do it. There is a little boy in Alex's class that has over 250 AR points (if you have an elementary student, then you understand what this is, basically reading and taking tests to earn points). That is amazing that he has so many!!! I'm not after that many points, as that boy must just LOVE to read, but I want the girls to at least strive to read more.
5. HOMEWORK. The girls don't study much. When they first got in school, I helped them study a lot. But slowly I noticed, that they didn't really have to study much. Once we forgot to even look at their spelling words, and they still made an A on their spelling tests. This is so easy for me, to not have to stress about making them study. But what I am realizing is that they need to learn good study skills, to help them later on in school. Learning how to study is almost as important as the material that you are actually learning.
I am so excited to make our fresh start at our new home. I was almost in tears yesterday, just thinking about how long I have waited on this to happen. The girls and I have lived at someone else's house for around 3 years now. We NEED our own space and it is finally happening. I haven't had my own closet in 8 years so it felt soooo good to unload all my clothes in that big ole closet, I almost wanted to lay down in it and just smile! Kate and Alex have never had their own closets, or their own room, or their own bed. I know they are gonna pass out when they come home from their dad's house tomorrow to see that they have their own rooms with big beds and decorations specifically for each of them. I feel as if we have been living on an RV for 3 years and we are finally going home. Finally settling down somewhere. One day I told Kate to go get her socks, she said she didn't know where they were. She said, "I just can't remember where we keep everything". That may not sound like a big deal to you, but to me, it was heartbreaking. When you are little, you should know where all your stuff is. You should have a stable environment, and be able to rely on certain things. I am so happy that I can finally provide this for them all on my own.
Now, off to pack up more boxes.......
***Sorry for all the rambling on this blog, sometimes it just happens that way!***
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