Some days; truthfully MOST days I have the answer to most of MY own questions, concerns and obstacles.... Being Scout's Mom has changed EVERYTHING! Personally I have NEVER understood spanking/hitting/hurting another creature in order to "teach" a lesson. My father "spanked" me once and cried more than I did. I still feel guilty for the added emotion and dramatics I included in the semi-swat that occurred at 415 Woodhurst Lane, Coppell Texas 75019 in 1988. Sorry Dad, I hope you realize that act of desperation was not well received by either of us! My mother pulled that card more often. It was generally out of frustration and lack of an alternative. Having a STRONG WILLED CHILD was foreign in the early 1980's. I get it, I don't feel I became an aggressive person because of them or their parenting. I have never been in a physical fight and I am 31 years old. However, speaking with friends, coworkers, and even my HUSBAND I am realizing despite the 10 spankings my mother gave me and ONE from my dad, its NOTHING compared with others and even some of SCOUTS friends TODAY in 2011......With all of the fabulous research, studies, personal testimony, etc... How can HITTING an innocent child for; forgetting to listen, forgetting to share, forgetting the truth, having an accident, missing the mark be OK? Who are WE to set up these expectations for our children? Aren't they a blessing? I finished reading SEVERAL STUDIES that include years of research, this was a favorite:

From the press release:

"Toddlers that are spanked more frequently at age 3 are at increased risk for being more aggressive at age 5," said Taylor, assistant professor of Community Health Sciences at Tulane and lead author of the study. "We found this to be true even after taking into account other factors that might have explained this association such as the parents' level of stress, depression, use of drugs or alcohol, and the presence of other aggression within the family."

Study authors asked nearly 2,500 mothers how often they spanked their 3-year-old child in the past month, as well as questions about their child's level of aggression, demographic features and eight identified maternal parenting risk factors. Almost half (45.6 percent) of the mothers reported no spanking in the previous month, while 27.9 percent reported spanking one or two times, and 26.5 percent reported spanking more than twice. Mothers with more parenting risk factors were more likely to spank frequently. However, even accounting for these potential confounding factors, frequent spanking at age 3 increased the odds of higher levels of aggression at age 5. Signs of aggression included behaviors such as arguing or screaming; cruelty, bullying or meanness to others; destroys things; fighting and frequently threatening others.

You can read the entire study online here

Yikes, what are WE doing???? I can safely say communication and praise are working for us. Scout is a STRONG WILLED CHILD and sometimes it takes everything I have to clearly draw the lines for him as a 21 month old baby, but it is worth it. He is an amazingly kind and compassionate soul. I am NOT saying he won't become some inhumane, selfish hillbilly who forgets to respect LIFE, but at THIS point I am proud of him and will continue to preach compassion and kindness as opposed to anger and hurt....

Forgive or not????

One of my favorite friends and I were talking about forgiveness and saying it was one of the important qualities of a person. According to dictionary.com, forgiveness means the act of forgiving and to forgive means to grant pardon for, to grant pardon to (a person) or to cease to feel resentment against.Gandhi said it well when he said that forgiveness is the attribute of the strong. For most people, to forgive is a difficult thing to do. In fact to forgive, it takes a whole lot of courage to do it. However, why do we find it so hard to forgive someone? Is is because of the need to let the person knows that we are angry with him/her? Or is it because if we forgive that person, it means that the person wins? I feel like so many people think that to forgive is all about the other person. I think that when you forgive someone, you free yourself from anger; anger is a very strong negative feeling and it blocks you from loving. Being angry sucks and allows the person or situation to take over control of you.

This is it?

Moments to Remember

I've been stressing myself out recently. I'm spending a lot of time thinking about 2011 and how its, already, a quarter of the way over, and how this should be that or that should be this, etc. Trying to be the optimist, I like looking to fill my crazy mind/world with joyous memories. Yesterday, while I was stressing about something super trivial, I am sure, I joined Scout (19 months) at his table as he colored. I grabbed a crayon and joined him.
Together, we colored backyardigans, trees, and even part of the table. We traded colors, we scribbled, we laughed. It felt good. It felt relaxed.
As Lil' Nugget and I bonded over Pablo, purples, greens and oranges, I watched his eyes focus and his head tilt. I watched his little hands manipulate crayons as he continuously looked at my hands for guidance. I watched his little 19 month old body sit in a chair, calmly, learning about the world around him.
I paused to realize that we were having a treasured momma-baby moment. That in this moment, what would look to any bystander to be a "normal" activity, was, actually, something to treasure. We were connecting more than we do during our morning snuggles or our late night snacks.. We were delighting in each other in the most simple yet amazing way.
Not wanting to break his focus, or the magic of the moment, I went back to my coloring. Realizing, of course, that this was a moment to be thankful for. Sure, we'd had first steps, first words and our first day of Mom's Day Out. Our family took a trip this year. My husband and I celebrated 4 years of existing together, more good than bad :)
All of those moments were moments to be thankful for as well. Of course.
But the moments that are uncelebrated and often missed: they're the ones to appreciate and hold onto FOREVER and EVER.

Part of the meaning of life is simply being HAPPY. I suppose it means looking at ourself as a good person? I am sure most of us have been taught that if we do something wrong, we’ll pay a price or suffer, right? Maybe we don't literally "pay" the price and just end up having to handle the consequences of our actions and words. What happens to us because of what we say or do, is up to us RIGHT ? I think it is, WE have power over what we say and do. What if you slip and you are not paying attention to what you are doing and accidentally place your palm on a hot burner; you will get burned. The burn is not a punishment; it is a natural consequence of putting your palm in the wrong place. So what about hurting others? Are we just being human?

Life in the play area today

I show up at a play area to meet up with a friend. The friend is great. The other family in the play area is not. A boy about five years old knocks over my lil' nugget. Twice. I could see that his newest sibling had just began to move. S took out his frustration on other little guys when NM began to move around and get into his stuff. Now, S was more the unwilling-to-share, not the make-them-cry-by-slamming-your-body-into-them-type but still. It happens.Both times I say: Sweetie, you need to be careful . (Thinking "little asshole")But the boy is already walking away.And his parents — both of whom are there — NEVER SAY A WORD. Even as my happy go lucky guys comes to me crying. I know that by the third time, I will have to call the parents out. Or glare at them. Or smack them up-side the head. But after visualizing the painful argument (I have done this before) with them over their son’s intentions. I follow Scout everywhere and move to keep him safe when the boy is within a few feet of him. Oh, and I glared at that family like they are animal abusers!!!! Of course, now, I can’t talk to my friend or enjoy my Route 44 HH Ice Tea. I can’t play with my son. Because I have to protect him from the boy who decided that picking on others was okay. And his parents who are too busy to care. When the spawn family finally leaves, I’m so excited that I consider throwing them a party except it would keep them in the same vicinity as us. After we leave the play area, I tell Scout that the boy was wrong for hurting him and not apologizing (he probably does not know what I am saying). And I offer an apology of my own for not knowing how to handle the situation. He could care less, he is already car seat dancing to PINK. But I’m still thinking of it a week later.Part of me hopes that mom reads my blog (she won't, my own friends don't really read it.) Because I want her to know how much she sucked that day.Part of me hopes that next time I can turn to the parents and calmly say: I need you to speak to your son or keep him away from my lil' nugget NOW!~ Most of me hopes that I never run into parents like that again.I understand that we all have bad days and ugly moments. But I’m having a hard time being okay with this. Because I don’t think that we have the right to have our bad days spill into other people’s days.

Don't mess with my little nugget Mr. and Mrs. Media!

Now that I am kicking major butt again (TOOT, TOOT MY OWN HORN!!!!) and on my second full month at the gym, I am reading books I have collected over the past year or two. My latest victory was Consuming Kids: Protecting Our Children from the Onslaught of Marketing & Advertsing by Susan Linn and I’m so glad I actually read it!!!!It basically highlights the insanity of corporate marketing to children and just how pervasive it is in our country. It is shocking to learn that the U.S. is one of only a handful of countries in the world that does NOT have laws against direct advertising to children. Thanks to the Federal Communications Commission who deregulated childrens TV in 1984 and basically gave advertisers the green light to barrage our children to buy, buy, and buy MORE!Linn makes a strong case in the book that marketing and advertising to children is NEVER be in their best interest. She makes her case that children are conditioned to be consumers from the time they are infants and every brand is competing for our kids to be the life-time customer they want. Linn shares over and over how marketing to children is only in the interest of the marketing agencies and corporations that directly profit from this 15 billion dollar industry. It is NEVER in the best interest of children. NEVER.Many people will say it’s the parents job to counter the affect of ads on kids and that parents must be involved in preventing the exploitation of children through ads. People complain that if we parents weren’t just so indulgent our children would have a sense of responsibility as consumers. Yet, time and time again, Linn argues that we parents are up against media and marketing 24/7 and an industry that spends more advertising to children than it does adults. In the chapter discussing the “Nag Factor” and other devious plans advertisers use to get children to undermine our parental authority….our children are actually taught whining skills to us to buy the products and help secure for brands for that “cradle to grave brand loyalty”. This is so terrible but has become so effective, ugh....The book explains really well how children are marketed to EVERYWHERE–from at home, to school, sports fields, magazines, the Internet, playgrounds, on the street....The book does include many recommendations of what YOU can do to make changes. I appreciated how Linn broke this section down into practical recommendations for people like me!After reading this book and a few others, I’m on board and ready to do my part. It will become part of my social mission to protect my little nugget from this :)