Surviving School Days: Three Moms’ Perspectives
The beginning of another school year often guarantees additional complexity and chaos in your schedule and family, which may already feel frayed and fragile. Each of our situations is different: only child or large family; homeschooling or traditional school; single ... Classroom windows open to walkways and gentle breezes unwittingly invite conversation into classrooms. As the spring day yawned to a close, I heard the shrill voice of a mother carry through my window screen. Her piercing ... It hits me how this mirrors parenting. Lately, I have been paddling hard, telling my kids where they’re off track and how they need to change what they’re doing. I tire myself this way. Instead, I should simply set my paddle in, fixed on what I know God is asking ... Despite nearly two years of therapy, when our adopted daughter, Ruth, turned 3, she displayed the physical abilities of an infant. Once, during a rare family dinner at a local diner, Ruth, who had cerebral palsy and was deaf, raised her fisted hand to click a spoon against her teeth. I have a complicated relationship with parenting books. As a new mother, I read all the books, analyzed all the angles, second-guessed all the decisions, and the only thing that saved my sanity is that Google had not yet been invented. That tightrope walk persisted for years until I learned to view ... A few weeks ago, my middle daughter asked to go to a local trampoline park as a family for her 7th birthday. We arrived at the facility, signed the hundreds of pages of waivers (I exaggerate only slightly), herded the children to a table, stashed shoes in cubbies and ... Our firstborn was about to enter kindergarten. We had struggled and prayed and labored over the decision of where to send him to school. I was pregnant with our third child, who was due soon after school was starting. The idea of a public school where I could just drop ... A simple cheddar cheese sandwich on white bread, purchased from a cart on the street near our hotel — this was my first meal in England circa 1984. Simple, yet wholesome, and perfect for a hungry college student just off her first international flight.
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Not too long ago, President Donald Trump referred to the MS-13 gangs plaguing the United States and most of central America as animals. At least in my feed, I heard a great deal of righteous indignation with his use of the term, especially because he is referring to ... Life is hard for a prodigal. Their lives are filled with fear, failure and frustration. Yes, much of it is of their own making. Those who love a prodigal are also filled with fear, failure and frustration. In their efforts ... Five years ago, I called a 302 on my son. A 302 indicates to the police that someone is either a harm to himself or others. It allows the authorities to search for him and admit him for evaluation though he might not be in possession of drugs or even doing anything ... “If possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all.” Paul gave that advice in Romans 12:18. But what does it mean to live peaceably with a prodigal? As families, we ... “Ssh! Don’t talk about it. Especially in church!” I once attended a Bible study with a small group of women who loved God deeply, knew the Bible well and had worked as hard as anyone could at motherhood, and yet eight ... When I was younger, I played softball. Geared in tight spandex with a hot pink aluminum bat, I was more concerned with how my hair looked in the god-awful hat I had to wear than my ERA. (Don’t be impressed that I know what that stands for; I grew up in a family that lived and breathed baseball. ...
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