Car keys, ice skates and sunshine...

Someone, anyone, please bring back global warming. Baby it is cold outside. I like a good snow storm as much as the next guy, but the cold is unreal. When the girls asked for a ride to the mall last night I was not a happy mommy.

"It is too cold." I said.
"Target is IN the mall mom. Please?" A chorus of teen/tween voices harmonized together.
"Fine." I said with as much enthusiasm as I could muster. It wasn't much.

And on the way there, in John's truck, we had 77WABC radio on. That is talk radio for the person pinging to South Korea. Anyway, some lady was on the Mark Lavine show and she was talking about saying no to our kids.

It happens to all of us she said. There are sometimes, weeks on end, when all we say is "No." No, because it is easier to say that. If we say yes, we have to pull out the glitter, the glue, the paint, the snow shoes, the cookie dough, or in the case of my teens, the car keys.





Life is easier with no...at least in theory.


Sometimes we all fall into the totalitarian parent mode. No is the quickest way to not have to serve...but we end up with kids who are constantly annoyed and rebellious. Totalitarianism works that way you see. The no only works temporarily when it is a lifestyle.

I got a taste of it on Christmas Eve. The town my husband retired from needs all kinds of documentation for us to switch health care plans...important things like marriage certificates...like John would put up with me if he didn't have that piece of paper!

Someone should have told Sr. Helene, the nun who told me to become a secretary and learn steno, that office work and ADD don't go well together. I am no secretary, but I sure could use one. You see a good secretary would know exactly where all that paper work is. Yeah, can you picture me, pulling out boxes and drawers looking for all the paper work to prove we are citizens and that we all belong to John? Yeah, that's me with my upper body in the attic, moving mice traps, trying to reach that box...the one from the move five years ago that never got unpacked from the last house...that never got unpacked from the move eleven years ago....Sigh.

So Christmas Eve. Papers have to be in the town hall by December 30th. The right thing to do would be to get all the paper work needed for our health insurance. The kids were good sports but I could see they were sad. I stopped the hunt and we went ice skating.


I went ice skating. I was the fun mom. The paper work would get done, another day would be stressful, but not Christmas Eve. For the record, all the kids fell a lot...I however, did not. And yes, I did actually skate the entire session. Wisenheimer.


Instead of being the cranky mom in Target last night, I went with the relaxed mom. I asked the girls to pray I would find one last paper so I didn't have to drive to the capital to get the records I would need. They promised, we shopped somewhat quickly and went home. First place I looked, I found the papers. Thanks Lord.

Sometimes, when we stop telling the Lord how bad things will be if we don't get something done, He is just waiting for us to shut up because He already got it done. Sometimes, we need to say "Yes" to the kids, just so we can bless them for no seemingly good reason. And sometimes that yes requires ice skates or car keys.

Yesterday, Maggie asked to paint...she painted about ten paper plates and made them into suns...you know because we have all this snow and maybe I would like a little extra sunshine in my kitchen to help keep me warm.









What can you say yes to today?