Don't really have a theme today...

Well, today is a quiet day, the boys and I went grocery shopping (a feat, lemme tell ya) and now we are home and all the groceries are put away. It was so nice being able to buy groceries, it was the first time we'd done a big trip in a month. My lunch is making, and the boys are eating theirs and Riley is watching old Looney Tunes cartoons.


Later today, I'll be sending out a care package to my soldier, I really hopes he likes everything :) And I can't wait to see what I can put in the next one. I got my first letter last week and so that was exciting. He's a really nice guy, from what I can tell.


Today I hope to accomplish cleaning up the little messes that have been left all over the house, and then taking the boys outside to play. Maybe even over to my sisters later to swim. Sigh.. this blog seems boring lol just like my day today, but it's a good boring, like just calm.


I'm looking forward to the possibility if I can go to California next month, I am hoping to take the boys to Disneyland for the first time, I think they'll LOVE it :) I want to take Riley before he starts to lose the magic of it. He may be only 7, but kids nowadays grow older much faster than their age. It saddens me, because I feel like their innocence in being a child is gone before they even get a chance to fully express their imagination.


I know for me, I grew up late, and then hit fast forward through my early adulthood. I still liked playing with dolls until I was 12-13 and I never really lost that. Playing dolls and dress up and babies. I wish I still had all of my collection from when I was a kid, but I don't have any of it. One thing I always wanted was my own wooden dollhouse. I still want one, with working lights. And since I make dolls, I could make all the people and stuff. I know as a teen I loved going to Tall Mouse and looking at all their doll house stuff. They even had carpet, and wood floors and wall paper. It was amazing. I never ever lost my imagination. I never ever lost my willingness to dream and believe in Magic.


I believe that I've become jaded through the years yes, like everybody, but I still have never lost the child in me that still believes. I guess that is like my faith in God. I have always had such a strong, unshakable faith in God, and that has been what has gotten me through the toughest chapters in my life. My faith is unshakable. And I guess that's me virtually throwing out a challenge to the the evil of the world to try and shake that faith, but that's not what I'm doing. I just believe. And that belief is stored in my heart.


I wish there was a way to stop the cruelty of this world in jading our children. I wish I didn't have to worry have my son being 10 or 12 years old and sexting girls, or having sex for the first time. Or whatever kids do that I didn't do until I was much older. How scary this world is that we can hardly let our children walk to the bus stop to help them gain independence, without the fear they will be kidnapped by some child predator. You are really never safe.


It's not enough we have to protect our children from other people, but we have to protect them from themselves. With drugs, and porn, and commercials, their minds are exposed. Exposed too early to addictions and harmful lifestyles. They are disrespectful and hurtful to their parents, the people who love them most in the world, and then are completely self -destructive. One thing that bothers me most is when people say, "If kids want to have sex, they'll find a way to do it, there's nothing you can do." WELL WHY NOT. Am I not their parent? Am I not the one who GAVE them life? How can I do nothing to stop a child from having sex?? It is CRIPPLING. I am Helpless and Scared of having teenagers or pre-teens.


It is the scariest thing in the world to be a parent. So scary. You hope to GOD you've done your job right by the time they are 11 years old, because once hormones kick in and they start Junior High.. there's practically nothing more you can do. You can hope and pray they are making the right choices, because by that time, your influence over their life is done. How scary is that... It used to be you had control til they were 18 and out of the house, then 16 when they got their license, then 14 when they started high school and started thinking they were adults.. and now pre-teens are having sex and smoking weed. Thirteen years old. Maybe some of you, who don't have children, and have or are smoking weed, don't think this is a big deal. But it is! Weed is the starter, sometimes that's all they do, but what if it's a gateway drug to something worse.


Yesterday, at Church they asked the congregation of about 300+ people, how many could raise their hands if they had a family member who was struggling with addictions.. can you guess how many people raised their hands? About half the church. That is CRAZY! I feel like there is nothing I can do to protect my kids.


I can't control who they meet at school. Who they make friends with. Riley is is going into 2nd grade. In first grade is was 6 years old and he came home asking me what BEER is because his friends at school, in his class, really like it. He's 6!!

(added 7/12/2011)

If at 6 years old, he is already being introduced to the idea of alcohol from children at school, then I know I can never feel safe at letting him go over to someone's house. And skipping ahead to when he's around 12 years old, when he wants to start earning his own money, can I let him start a paper route without following him to every house? No, I can't. Because there are SO many evil people in this world, he is barely safe out side of the house on his own.

There's this show called Vanished, on lifetime, that I watch and I swear it's made me ever more paranoid than I already was. But they showed the first Milk Carton child was a 12 year old paper boy, who was kidnapped and then brought into a cult for sexual predators and he was kidnapped on his FIRST morning out without his parents. He didn't want to wake them, and wanted to do it on his own. And then he was gone.

Or the 9 year old little girl in Florida who was taken out of her bed. Raped by a convicted child molester, and then buried alive 200 yards from her front door.

These stories are MASSIVE. I start to wonder why we even have children if we can't even protect them.

Even me, at 4 years old, was almost kidnapped by a man on the sidewalk in front of my house. If not for my Dad coming outside at the EXACT right second with a baseball bat, I would not be writing this today. I would probably be dead. With too many horrible things done to me before my death.

Just food for thought.

Today, I am thankful I still have time.. and that I can do everything I can to keep them safe.