Snowed in for TOO LONG!!!!!!

If you are like me, you might be going crazy by now being stuck in the house!!!!  My kids feel the same.  When they groan when it is announced that school in called off again we have a problem. It looks like we will have one more day at home, but we will survive.

I have had a lot of time with the kids and their friends the last few weeks.  In fact they have all gathered here for the last few days.  I love listening to the things they talk about.  We are pretty open around here, and I think most of the kids feel comfortable if they have been here more than once, so we usually hear a lot.  I love every minute of it!  I also have noticed how different they all are.  Many are starting to think about school and what they want to be.  They are most in their junior and senior years.  I myself have been thinking quite a bit about where my kids are going in life.  I am 39 and still do not know what I want to be when I grow up,

My view on my kids life and careers have always been a little different.  Above all I want my kids to have God as their center, someone to love and build a life with, and a career they love to support themselves.  We also pray that our kids will learn from mistakes they have either seen us make or we have told them about.  I know they will make many of their own.  That is just part of growing up.  I wish so much more for them.  I am not talking about material things.

I was talking with a woman last week and she made a comment. I had told her how Colton has found his niche at the tool school at Ben Davis.  He cannot wait to get up and go each day.  In fact he was the only one who has 100% in the class.  If you know Colton that is major!  He is the kid that I have always said will get by on charm.  He is smart.  Do not get me wrong.  But if he does not love it he does not always apply himself.  I went on to tell her how he is thinking on going to Vincennes because when he leaves the BD program he will already have college credit there and in about a year and a half could start his career.  She went on to tell me how she wanted more than that for her child.  Why would we encourage him to go to a lower grade college.  At first I thought who do you think you are, and then I actually laughed. I do not really "know" this woman.  If we were friends I would have had an opinion.  Any of my real friends can tell you that.  Several of my friends and I do not share the same view on things, We agree to disagree and we are ok with that.  It made me think of the impression we give our kids of what makes them successful.

I find myself worrying about what their ACT scores are or what they will be.  How they will make it the world how it is now.  And then we have a week like this.  All of our kids are different.  None of them are perfect.   They make mistakes, just as we have made many as parents.  I never say never.  This week Colton on Sunday volunteered to go around and shovel snow for anyone who needed help.  In fact a ton of the kids here were out doing it.  Yesterday we drove to a few people who needed help and could not get out.  Last night we were driving home from his shoveling and we stopped to warm up Jeff's truck.  We were by there and Colton had the keys so thought he would get it cleared off for his Dad.   On the way home a car in front of us got a flat.  Colton stopped in front of him, Jeff behind him and figured out how to pull the man to a parking lot.  I have a friend from high school who needed a ride to radiation today.  I could not go.  Colton has never met her and said I will take her.  So he has been gone all day and said he would be late because he was helping her clear off her driveway and car.  I am not saying this to brag on Colton.  I am saying this because we put so much emphasis and pressure on what school our kids might attend and what career they will pick for themselves.  I look at him, and so many of his other friends who have good hearts.  They choose to help others.  At the age of 17 and 18 they are already better men than many will ever be no matter the career they pick.  In my eyes he is already a success!

I am not saying that I am not going to encourage my kids to dream big and be all they can be.  I am saying I am not going to feel like I failed as a parent if they choose a path that might not be the one that looks successful to the world.  It does not matter what their test scores are, or what honors they receive, if we do not teach them to be good people.

We have been lucky to have pretty good kids.  We cannot take all of the credit for that.  We have many friends who are good parents and their kids have gone down very bad paths.  There is still hope. I read an article about a professor who held up and $20 bill and asked if anyone wanted it.  They all raised their hands.  Through the story he crumples it, stomps on it, throws it in the dirt and each person in the class still wants it. That bill did not lose its value based on the dirt it has been through.  It is the same with each of our kids.  We all make bad choices.  That child still has value and you are still a good parent by loving them and standing by them.

God has a plan for each one of us.  If we all picked the same path it would be a pretty boring world that we live in.