The first dance of the year and I got issues

This past weekend the Princess and I had a little run in. She doesn't always tell the truth and I have a serious problem with that so when she is confronted about something it's so hard to believe her. After work on Friday I went by the school to try to get in to the dance they were having to take some pictures for them, at their request. When I got there, I spotted Ty dancing and didn't want to bother her and Princess was not where to be found....until......I see her being dragged out of the crowd by a teacher and a boy in the teacher's other hand. So I sit back and watch, because it's not like I was suppose to be there. I see Tricia's lil hands all over the place and she is on the verge of tears while Mr. Teenage boy is just standing with his arms crossed all tough. So after a few minutes of watching this when it looks like things have calmed down I walk over and don't even look at Princess. I ask the teacher if everything is okay and she says in a stern tone, BTW I don't care for this teacher to begin with so it is tough trying to be nice to her, "Is one of these yours?" and I tell her Princess is my daughter and she goes on to say this young man was dancing very close to on her backside and had his hands on her hips, oh and "I don't know what you allow, but we don't allow at home but we don't allow that here. Princess starts right away explaining how she didn't know. I am irritate at her and with her and I don't know if she is telling the truth so I go off on her. The teacher starts in on the boy while I am speaking to my daughter. The teacher starts to walk away and so does the boy and I say HOLD IT to which he responds "Yea"....EXXXXXCUUUUUUUUUUUUUUSE me.... "Yes, Ma'am". I finish talking to Trish and tell him to come here. NOW.........when the teacher started talking to him I hear his name, the same boy that tried to smack my daughter on the butt that I am not suppose to know about cause I am not reading their blogs, so I am really PISSED. So I send Trish away and he asks if he can say something and I don't let him I say my piece first..."Don't you EVER put your hands on my children again, do you know who my children are? If I hear of you touching my daughters' inappropriately we will have a REEEEEAAAAAAALLLLLL problem, do you understand me? If you need your Mom or Dad to talk to me I am happy to give you my cell phone number if we have any problems or lack of communication, do we? I am not playin with you, do not put your hands on my girls, got it?" All he says in a low voice lookin at me like I am CRAZZZZZZZZZZy white woman is Yes ma'am. To which I respond GOOD! then he asks if he can say something meanwhile I need to walk away so I don't strangle him, the lil boy who I have to look up to to yell at, arrrrrrrrrrrggggggg. I think I could take him!!! I was pretty fired up. ;) Just kidding I only beat my own kids. LOL So, he tells me that he wasn't even touching princess. That he turned and said to his boy look at this and put his hands around her waist but didn't touch her. he demonstrated. WHATEVER is what I wanted to say but instead I said, Don't put your hands on my kids, got it! He said yes and as he was walking away, I know I just need to shut up, I said I got my eyes on you. So 15 minutes later when he looks over at me I motion to him that I am watching him and his eyes just get big. I know I could have handled that differently I am sure and I thought about it after the fact realizing I should count to ten before I speak when I am upset. So after the dance the girls and a group of friends, including tall boy that all the girls are falling all over walk over to me so I can take a pic. Princess wraps her hands around this boy to take the pic and his hands fly in the air like, "I ain't touchin her" and he looks scared. I say you can take a pic with her I just don't want you to INAPPROPRIATELY putting your hands on them, do you know what that means or I can explain it to you?" He just shakes his head yes and I realize I just said that in front of all the friends, so I try to make all the boys feel stupid by saying and that goes for all of you!!! Princess looked proud and Ty looked like she wanted to crawl under a rock. OH WELL!!!

Teenagers

It's so hard having teenagers, all the horrible stories you hear, well I hear from all my coworkers and other people in my life, all the hard times they have been through , the testing and the fights, thinking back to my memories as a teen and how INCREDIBLY challenging I was. HOLY COW, those memories are the only ones I need to be skeptical, leery, cautious, nosey and everything else I find myself being. I don't like it though, but I hear my Mother's words ringing in the back of my head....."You are so naive, just like I was, remember when you told me this, when you did this" and it raises all kinds of flags. I keep telling myself that MY girls are NOT me. They have not gone through the things I did as a child, they have not been exposed to the things I was as a child and more importantly they are not being raised the way I was as a child.

HOWEVER...even with all that said....trust has to be earned, right! I do not want to let my guard down and regret it. The other side of that is I feel a little, very little guilty about snooping, eavesdropping and reading of the notes/blogs. And I think because really I have found NOTHING. They are only 13 though, but today that doesn't mean anything either from some of the stuff they have shared with me.

I do feel blessed that we are very close and they feel comfortable telling me about stuff their friends do that they don't approve of and sharing who uses bad language, who has kissed a boy already, who sneaks on the phone late at night, but then all my suspicions raise like...they must be doing these things to and seeing how I am going to react...a little trick I did with my Mom at that age. Who knows, parenting is hard, single parenting is super hard. I pray hard every night for them, their values and for me to continue to be the best parent I can be to them, but by the time you know, as a parent you did a good/bad job, it is to late to change anything.

So alllllllllll this stemmed from this past weekend, Ty spent the night at a friends (a new friend I hadn't met yet, always leary of the new ones) and then she stayed at our house the following night. She seemed VERY sweet and very respectful, innocent and happy young lady. I met her Mom on Friday and she gave me good vibes as well. SOOOOOOOO, she has a myspace account, which I am not fond of, but whatever..... and she was on it and they girls were uploading pics I had taken of them and her Mom came to pick her up and so she didn't sign out. HERE I GO!!!! I closed my door and locked it and started reading, feeling guilty and nervous about what I might find but it's for my kids, I need to know who they are hanging out with. After reading more then I could stand....really searching for a nugget of some bad thing, I found nothing. GUILT really set in. She is as sweet as she appears and even more so. She is a good friend. She is focused on school and her studies and she values her friendships. So, I am good!!!

AM I WRONG??????? What every mother out there done the same thing??? AM I CRAZY??? As soon as they turn 14 am I going to be worse??? I sure hope not cause more then anything i don't want to push them away with my craziness.

Here are a few pics from this past weekend

W.W. Friends for Always Family Forever

How do they go from this.....


(Soooooooo cute)
(Ty is always on that side, funny)


to this
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Where does the time go????????

My growing girls,,

I am trying to stick with what I said and write. This whole weekend I was pretty much laid up cause I hurt my freakin back again!!! The girls were so good to me and taking care of me. I am so proud of them sometimes. If I could just teach them how to be neat and tidy they might be perfect. ;)

Today I had a very grown up conversation with them, one I was nervous about. One I wasn't sure how they would react, but knowing them as well as I do, I was okay with whatever the reaction would be. It is a very personal matter, having to do with their dad, but they stepped up as I anticipated and I am so proud of them. I am so proud of how mature they handle my questions and reacted. I have never said an ill word to them about their Dad. I have never pulled them in one way or another from him. He chose to live the life he has and go down the path he did. When he met them when they were four I gave him every opportunity to be a father. I made every effort possible, gave 110% when he gave 2%. Now, at age almost 14 they are wiser then I expected and although they hurt as a result of his actions they will step up to the plate when it comes to protecting their little sisters from the same hurt and the same pain they went through of having an in and out part time Dad. Although they still don't understand they situation and why they haven't seen him in over two years and why he continues to fight to see the two little ones, none of that matter when it came down to them standing up to him. Well not yet, but maybe down the road. They are ready to step up if they have to.

My once little precious babies that I could hold both in one arm have grown in to two mature young ladies with a conscience and mind that makes good decisions from the heart. I am so proud of you two, more proud then I can ever show you, but I hope tonight when we talked you could see the sparkles in my eyes that are you!!!!!!! Mommy loves you!!!

Back to school night 8th grade style!!!!

I went to back to school night last night. I always enjoy back to school night because I like to meet my girls teachers and see what they are in for. I like to be prepared to know how I can help them and what the expectations are. Well was I in for a surprise last night...who knew?? Not me!! 8th grade, completely different from all the previous years..different grading and different teaching. HOLY COW. I think 8/9 out of the 12 teachers I saw last night (cause I have to try to get to two classes for every ONE slot they give you, so I can meet alllll the teachers) said "These kids are grown up now.....blah blah blah" WHAT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!?????????? What do you mean..my babies!!!! Then they would say something like, "They are 13/14 and it is time for them to grown up." Well yes I guess it is but ...... my babies!!! So, it was an eye opener for me. They all kept saying how they treat them as high schoolers and really give them a taste so they are ready for next year "when they are among 17/18/ and even some 19 year olds". My tummy flip flopped. I am really not ready for this but I can only imagine how they are going to feel. I don't remember being scared going in to high school, but probably cause I knew a lot of the older kids....I remember being very comfortable. They have a lot more freedom too, as far as going to their lockers and being in the halls. Last two years they were only allowed to go to their lockers at certain times a day and I think only three total. This year they can pretty much go before/after every class, but if they are late to any class four times they get after school suspension. I guess teaching them time management. It's good for them!

ANYWAY... so the teachers all seem pretty good, some super strict and tough, but I like that. I think tough is good!!! I think the tough teachers are the ones that make a difference. They have a lot more male teachers this year too, something else new for them. So, I was there from 630 to 910, and met 12 teachers, one was out for surgery and had a god night. I was sad to that there was so little participation on the parents part. These teachers taught our children allllll day and stayed at the school in to the evening and you can't come out to meet them.....I don't like it. This school has very low parent participation. At back to school night at their previous school there were so many parents that came (mom and dad of many of the kids) that there were never enough seats in the class. One of the classes I went to last night had about 7 parents in it and that was the most. :(

Parents out there: GET INVOLVED with your kids and the schools!!!!!!!!!!!!! I don't think any parents read my blog but just in case someone stumbles upon it!!!!!!!!!!!! ;)

Wordless Wednesday - Growing up

2004

2006

2008

Kids are funny, especially toddlers

So, on our long trip to Fl the baby sat in the middle of me and B. As the sun came up and we were getting closer she suddenly became super awake and super bored. I started playing the What does the ____ say/do" game with her. She really loves this game and singing also. So we are going through the basic animals; cat, dog, cow, sheep...you know all the ones kids that age know. I was saying the animal noises with her too. Then we get to piggy. Oh the piggy, which most kids will say "Oink, Oink"...me I like to snort cause it's funny to see the lil ones react and my kids loved it when they were little. Adri belts out with laughter and then she tries to do it also. This had us laughing so hard we almost had to pull over, Adri laughed with us too. "Auntie, again, again" Of course I broke out the camera because her piggy face snorting was the CUTEST ever. We also made fishes faces which entertained for at least 30 more minutes. How cute is this munchkin....

Piggy
Piggy
Fishy
Fishy

I love her!!!!! I wish I took a viseo of the piggy!! Note to self: take video of piggy!!

Why I can't seem to blog

So I want to blog/write/journal/update.....

My issue is that everytime I think about doing it I think where do I begin because it's been so long since the last time and there is sooo much I want to write and document. hmmmmm This is my block, this is the reason I can't get it together. ARRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGG I am frustrated.

Sooooo, I went to FL with the girls and B and her fam, S. too. We drove 13 hrs there actually I think it was more like 14 but I lost track. It wasn't so bad going, coming home was a different story though. We were crammed in and we got a flat in the first two hours of driving. :(

While we were in FL we went to Sea World a GAZILLLLION times. No seriously we went everyday except one and sometimes several times a day. I think by day five we actually saw everything and every show. How do people do it one day I dont know. The one day we didn't go we were at Busch Gardens allllllllllllll day. It was great but we were so freakin tired by the ride home, even the kids. We did get to see a lot of cool animals. Actually I have seen more animals this year then I think ever in my life. I took alot of pics. WAY too many. I think I took almost 2000 that week in FL. Maybe 1500. A LOT is what I know. How can I go through that many pics to share some? ;) Hmmmmm Way to hard. It was amazing vacation and also the first full week I have taken off in six years. Okay gonna share a few photos.



Before I do though I am going to commit to trying to update on Mondays about the weekend, Wordless Wednesdays, cause that should be easy to do, I have seen lots of bloggers do it and I like it, and on Thursday or Friday. Okay can I hold myself to this PLEASE!!!! I have made a new pack with my girls... they are not allowed to get on the computer unless they write for 15 minutes first. Sooo, if I am gonna hold them to that I have to hold myself to writing also.



My life is not very exciting but there are things I want to remember moments with friends and my girls that if I do not make my lazy but type them I will forget them. I should make that my title so I can remind myself. Any of my wonderful friends out there that may check in here once in a while, please shoot me an email to remind me it is time to write again.



Okay that is all...time for a few pics.