A Normal {for us} Christmas

I have one point of comparison--my own--to judge a right and good Christmas. 

It always involves a candlelight service on Christmas Eve and then a long night's stretch to find the loot I've accumulated for months in all my best hiding places.  After that, we assemble, assemble, assemble until the wee morning hours (2:30am this particular year).  

I don't know if it was the glass of wine or the extreme fatigue, but I was downright giddy when I fell into bed.

Moreover, despite my good intentions, I'm resigned to the fact that every year there will be a certain toy/candy/clothing that I find in the dark recesses of my closet 'roundabout March that shall remain ungifted.

So what makes a normal Christmas?  ("Normal? What does anyone in this family know about normal? We act normal, Mom! I want to BE normal!" -my girl Violet in the Incredibles) 

This beleaguered tree and the subsequent photos tell a lot about our current "normal" and how it played out this holiday season.

For instance, for their own protection, no gifts nestled there until after bedtime on the evening of December 24.  As we approached the holiday, there were a paltry amount of unbreakable ornaments hung from 40 inches down (Josh's wingspan), with the netting and ribbon ripped off and hastily put back on multiple times.  The mid-tier is occupied by homemade baubles while the upper reaches, untouchable except to the well-placed football spiral, play home to my irreplaceable Baccarat and Waterford ornaments.



"Normal" involves gifting a six-year-old with a long history of abrasions and accidents, who is on a first-name basis with the TMH stitches tech, with his very own pack of fireworks. 

(Oh yeah.)

"Normal" involves me reading this card as fra-jeely, thanks to too many late Eves with The Christmas Story blaring in the background as we assembled toys guided solely by a glass of wine and byzantine Chinese directions. 

"Normal" includes Mr. Moneybags (aka Collin) springing for everyone a gift from the WDW souvenir shop at Epcot, perhaps the most overpriced shopping venue on the planet.

"Normal" encompasses me giving my fra-jeely item from said gift shop to a two year old so that he'll stop fussing.

The person who worked so crazy hard to pay for the gifts?  Him getting his stocking down last? Well, I suppose, right or wrong, that is our current "normal."

Oh, and it is particularly "normal" for me to percolate Big Plans to stretch my meager cooking skills by making homemade cinnamon rolls, only to discover no baking powder in the cupboard come late night Dec 24.  Even Walmart was closed at this juncture.  After a crazy vinegar/baking soda substitution, I can only embrace this flukey Christmas morn deliciousness as the new norm.  



One absolute "normal" mainstay of Christmas is balls.  Not the pretty, fra-jeely, sparkling kind, but the synthetic rubber sort that can be kicked/hit/thrown to death until they lie deflated and moldy and hidden in a bushy area of our yard (only to be replaced by the ball fairies the next Christmas).

As the day wound down and we were stuffed silly with candy, candy canes, candy corns, and syrup, it only seemed "normal" to take a long walk with Kate Middleton in the woods.

And then to stop

and play games under the strangely creative and unpredictable direction of Dad-- "normal" games that, in a still frame of the camera lens, might seem rather odd.

Take it from the Head Elf---it was pretty darn funny.

Thirty seconds to spell out a word as a team?  Unfortunately our "normal" canine audience-of-one has very poor spelling skills and couldn't figure out any of the words.  However, she very much enjoys loud antics involving lots of laughing/snorting/other bodily noises from her littermates.

Christmas day ended with a seemingly "normal" moment as Mom's headline gift was run up the grand ole flagpole.  Texans will be Texans till the day they die, after all.  This normally somber and patriotic moment was made more jolly

by a dancing band of elves doing a cowboy jig and hollering yeehaws while eeking out a broken rendition of "The Eyes of Texas are Upon You" as best as these Florida-born buckaroos could.  

Hope you and yours had a very "normal" Christmas, too!

Lucky 13

My firstborn turns 13 tomorrow.  Many thoughts have cycled through my mind in anticipation of this teenager entering our midst.  Allow me to simplify them:

 I am grateful to even know this person.

 Innocence still exists.

She consists of equal parts brilliance and joy. 

She is 100% Madeleine, 100% of the time.  

 To know her is to love her.  

Happy Lucky 13 to my world changer. 

See you later, Gator. {I promise.}

This brilliant and complex man passed away on a calm Friday morning.  Josh and I walked in the room right when it happened.  It was shocking, but in retrospect seems appropriate, somehow, that he would breathe his last just as his youngest grandson- his legacy- breathlessly burst through that familiar door in search of some Granddaddy-time.

Life devastates you some mornings.

Then all of the sudden those you love grieve as son and husband become pallbearer and mourner.

The sadness sweeps in.

And in parting I say: Dr. Roberts, I loved you.  You could be frustrating at times and you held close to your own opinions, but you never, ever waivered in your support of me.   My fan club is small but you were active among them, rallying me in the difficult moments just as I was sinking.

You could see the end result when all I could see were the endless diapers.

You looked in your grandchildren's eyes and found what was fine and rare and worth praising when all I could look at was immature behavior, frustrating words, and messy faces.

Thank you for always reconciling with me when either of us got mad. (What was it that upset us again?)

Thank you for being tender and thoughtful in the times when I expected toughness.

Thank you most of all for raising the man I love.  Your best qualities shine brightly in him.

I am glad for that calm Friday morning when we came searching and discovered that peace had already found you.

Millard Mason Roberts 

December 18, 1930 - October 10, 2014

Special Privileges

The older kids in our household get lots of special privileges.

They are trusted to stir the bubbling pots before things get burned. 

And their services are often required to check the food in the microwave.  Ouch!  Better wear an oven mitt--that might be hot!

They also get to coach PE on a regular basis.  Whatever Big Sissy says, goes.

Except when it doesn't.  Then the Tickle Monster comes out.

After all, special privileges have their own rewards.

Picking the Apple: How We Are Parenting Technology

I have been thinking long and hard about a famous story.  The story goes like this:

There was once an apple that changed the world, but not for the better.  That apple gave humans access to the knowledge of good and evil, and it destroyed our most valued relationships, with God and with each other.

 No---wait.  That's not the story I want to tell.  It goes more like this:

There was once an Apple that changed the world, but not for the better.  That Apple gave humans access to the knowledge of good and evil, and it destroyed our most valued relationships, with God and with each other.

Pretend like this cool pic has iPhones, Mini's, and iPads,
not innocent little nanos and shuffles.  I happen to love the music playing options.

I know this post is starting out a bit radical.  Maybe I am becoming a radical, although I've always viewed myself as a fairly normal, mainstream kind of gal.  The thing is--I find myself trying to forge a new path through the technology wilderness in an era when technology is a silent and often unacknowledged danger.  I'm no published expert on the speaker circuit, just a mere foot soldier in the battle.  But for the public record, I'd like to report the truth as I see it happening from the front lines of modern parenting.

We do own Apple products, in fact my 40th birthday gift was an iPad.  I've found that my daughter (7th grade) could care less about gaming or goofing around on touch screen technology and dislikes even reading on the Kindle.  She does do computer programming and a little game coding on the laptop, but this is a "creative" tool for her.  In other words, she uses technology not for entertainment, but as one would use a brush and paints:  to make something new out of nothing.  I'm all for that kind of activity.

My son (5th grade), however, loves to do anything that involves computer gaming.  He used to be hooked on the Wii, and when we got the iPad, he started small with apps like Scribble and Pop Math, which seemed innocent enough.  But all addictions start small, don't they?   Ask any addict of anything at all how it started, and I'll wager it was with something simple and seemingly safe.

With my son, he initially found himself mesmerized by the bright flashing features, the cool sounds, the constant motion on the screen.  Then he was sucked into gaming even deeper by his natural inclination to be loyal, even loyal to a digital team. The push notifications asking him to come back to play or telling him his troops were ready for battle (Clash of Clans) were like an alcoholic smelling the beer from outside the bar.  Despite his inner desire to restrain himself, he was constantly lured in for more (Romans 7:19).

I thought it was just a boy's fun.  That is, until I got my Visa bill one day and there were many, many charges of $9.99, $50, $100, that came to almost $3,000, all charged to my iTunes account that month.  I thought for sure my account had been hacked.  I only have bought a few songs here and there through the years, never anything more than a dollar or so a month.  Looking back, I was such a sucker to let a naive little boy on something as powerful as touch technology linked to a credit card account. 

The source was Baseball Superstars, which I thought it was a simple sports app, but that was a completely wrong assumption.  Doing more research after the fact, I discovered it really targets adult gamers and addictive gambler types.  As he got more advanced in the game, he was being asked to buy his team new uniforms on Baseball Superstars, give them massages, help them with special practices, all of which were bought with "points" that he thought were earned during the game but in reality were REAL LIVE MONEY being charged to my card.  Ouch and double ouch.

The slithering snake of deception, the one that preys on the young and vulnerable, reached right through that iPhone and bit me hard.

We warned him about passwords and such, gave him punishments of various sorts, and restricted the technology in his life (and he has never owned his own touch technology, just to be clear), but again and again we would see him fall into the same patterns of an addict: thinking about gaming the first thing when he woke up, sneaking my phone, hiding in the bathroom, lying to me.  If you know him, you would likely agree that these characteristics are not at all reflective of his usual personality.

To save him from himself, he is now off technology completely.  What else could we logically do?  There cannot be "a little on the weekend" or "just on the car trip."   He cannot take a single sip or he will fall off the wagon again.  It's a hard line to take as a parent when this very technology surrounds him, resides in his home, and permeates the lives of his friends.

Why so radical, you say?

Because touch technology will rob him of everything good in his life if we don't stand firm.

It will rob him of laughing in the kitchen with me, fully engaged and present in the conversation.  It will rob him of good academics and quiet times alone when he can think and reflect.  It will dissolve the lasting richness of in-person friendships and the satisfying small moments of wrestling around with his brother and talking football strategy with his dad.  It will rob him of nothing less than joy.

Kyle Strobel put it this way:

I think one of the most difficult aspects of being an American Christian is trusting that Jesus is right and that our culture is selling us something that ultimately isn’t a valid way to be joyful — and is actually the very thing that destroys joy. 

I love him too much to let him eat the Apple, only to be consumed whole by it in return.  Shockingly, apparently Steve Jobs agrees with me.  Did you know he didn't allow his own children to use the very iPad he created?  It's true--read it here.

And what of my son's friends and my daughter's friends, all of whom own touch technology?  That is for their parents to decide, but for now I am firm that my children will not go on overnights with children who have these products to use freely.  I will not have my son in a friend's basement, essentially unsupervised, with his buddy's iPad Mini where they will have access to things like pornography at a single tap.  While I absolutely cannot see my son initiating this kind of behavior, wouldn't it be easy for the other kids present to pull up?  I try to be very in touch with him, but how in the world can I possibly know and trust the private thought lives of his (also immature and vulnerable) friends?

Moreover, I find that I am in the thin sliver of minority when it comes to parenting technology and social media.  I ask other parents out of curiosity: "Why does such-and-such own this?  What are you thoughts on him/her having it?"  Or "Is this username trying to friend me on Instagram your son/daughter?"  One reply I hear frequently: "Well, they begged me to get them an account, so it's okay that they are under the age allowed on Instagram." Or I also am told, "Johnny bought it with his own allowance that he saved for a whole year, so how could I say no?"  Which leads me to my next question, one that I hardly ever ask aloud but put before myself on a regular basis: "Who is in God-given control of this relationship?  You or your child?"

I may sound alarmist, but my mama instinct is sounding off that there is untold danger of the self-inflicted kind ahead for my children's generation.  Although The Screwtape Letters was published in 1942, C.S. Lewis sounds downright contemporary in writing:

It does not matter how small the sins are provided that their cumulative effect is to edge the man away from the Light and out into the Nothing.  Murder is no better than cards if cards can do the trick.  Indeed the safest road to Hell is the gradual one--the gentle slope, soft underfoot, without sudden turnings, without milestones, without signposts.

Or, if I may be so bold as to add on to Master Lewis:

Indeed the safest road to Hell is the gradual one--the gentle glowing screen, the easy to use apps, the smooth digital world without sudden jolts, without thinking minds, without limits on knowledge or images, without the Holy Spirit, without love....

So, how about you, fellow parents?  How do you manage this complicated issue in your home?

Food for thought: 
how would you describe someone who boldly holds out an Apple to us that he won't 
even allow in his own children's hands within his own home?

Baby Showering

In September, the captains of the Salvation Army are having their first baby, Rebecca Joy, and we jumped at the chance to give them a baby shower.  They serve so many of the most poor and needy in our town on a daily basis and with such compassion that it felt wonderful to give them a morning of hospitality in return.

It's been a long while since I've baby showered anyone.  I looked around on Pinterest and nearly had a nervous breakdown from all the exceedingly cute projects.  I didn't use a single one.  Plain and simple, idea overload short circuits my creative batteries (what remains of them).  Zap.

Since the captains are moving into a new home this week, I decided to do potted flowers in simple arrangements that they could take home and plant in their yard.  I think they worked out just fine.

Madeleine laid out the pretty invitations using our favorite easy graphic design program and helped me with the cooking and meal planning. I also benefited from some last minute pinch-hitting from Auntie Anne and Costco.

The baked cheese grits were definitely the most popular thing on the table.  Since I was unexpectedly running low on time, I took some shortcuts like upgrading store-bought  brownies with homemade creme de menthe buttercream and mint leaves from our yard.  Quick but yummy.

(Puppet break for the little guy.  Hey, someone had to keep him from destroying the table arrangements!)

The mom-to-be is a Brazilian beauty who is usually decked out in her Salvation Army uniform.  Today she wowed us in a beautiful turquoise maxi dress.  The moment Luci came in our front door, her eyes welled up with gratitude.  It was so touching and felt marvelous to do something small for this delightful woman.  She truly has laid down everything to serve others.

Baby food guessing contest.  Had to do it.

Presents and games aside, my favorite part of the shower was getting to pray as a group for her sweet baby.  It was a memorable moment that required no input or inspiration from Pinterest.

Congratulations, Captains Luci and Julio!