Rantings of a Creole Princess

Maclaren Stroller Recall!

Maclaren Stroller Recall!

Children & Nicknames

Do you have nicknames for the children in your life?  What are they?  How'd they get the nickname?

Question...

If your kid got suspended from school today would you let them go Trick or Treating tomorrow?

Question...

Murderesses Velma Kelly (a chanteuse and tease who killed her husband and sister after finding them in bed together) and Roxie Hart (who killed her boyfriend when she discovered he wasn't going to make her a star) find themselves on death row together and fight for the fame that will keep them from the gallows in 1920s Chicago.

That's the synopsis of the musical "Chicago."

Would you have a problem if your child's high school decided to do this musical?  Would you have a problem with your child being in the musical?

Holiday Celebrations

Should a school stop Holiday celebrations just because one student's family doesn't allow them to participate or should the student have something out of class planned for them by the school so that the rest of the children may enjoy the Holiday their parents allow them to celebrate?

Ghost Dad

A major part of who I am today comes from knowing who I "come from."  I know my people WELL and understand how a lot of the way I am comes from watching them and it makes me go hmmmmm...

Cuz I know I'm a LOT like my father. 

But what if I didn't know that?  What if I never knew who my father was?  What if I never interacted with him enough to know that with personalities and brain power like ours there needs to be balance with kindness, love and empathy.

I was blog hopping in another dimension recently and I found a blog by a guy who'd just met his father for the first time.  He always knew who the guy was because they lived in the same city.  He knew of a few of his half siblings and he knew his paternal Grandmother.  But he never "knew" the guy.

I read that he'd see glimpses of his father moving about the city throughout his life and that once his father passed right by him in the grocery store and didn't make eye contact with him.  He knew who he was immediately and states that he felt an electric current being that close to the man who helped give him life.  When he came out of the store he knew his father was still in the parking lot waiting on him to come out but he didn't approach him and...being a man...the young man got angry and left.

Wow.  That ish was deep.

I know people who didn't "know" or know their fathers and I never really GOT it until I read that.  I never really GOT how you could live your life with a WHAT IF just that huge in your life.

What if my father had been in my life.

Tell the truth and shame the devil but I feel like yeah...it's a very good excuse for lots of things.

Knowing who you are and where you come from are very important and I hope more of the future generations will have this.  In the nature versus nurture debate I'll always believe that it's BOTH.  A bit of nature AND a bit of nurture.

Do you know YOUR father or was he always moving around on the peripherals?  Do you know how to FIND your father if you don't know him?  Have you ever looked for him?  WOULD you ever?  Do you ever wonder...WHAT IF?  

Did your father live in your home and yet...you STILL didn't KNOW him?

Do your children know their father?  How do you explain to a child where their father is and when do you have this TALK?

Do you ever really GET IT when someone talks about never having their father in their life?

Question...

Do you remember Garanimals?  Did you used to wear?  They're back with a huge PR blitz.  Would you buy for your kids?

Still got those Baby Einstein DVDs?

You knew it didn't you?  You watched your precious bundle take off it's diaper and empty the contents in a corner on your new Persian rug and then run around nekkid squealing "No boom boom no!" and you thought to yourself...Those Baby Einstein DVDs might not work huh?  TELL THE TRUTH AND SHAME THE DEVIL!  

No Einstein in Your Crib? Get a Refund

Question...

Do you drink around kids?  Did you parents drink around you?

Parental Units Sans Ropas

Have you ever walked in on your parents? 

Have YOUR kids ever walked in on YOU?

How did you handle?

From My Inbox Question...

You have a middle school aged child.

Your child has been having behavioral problems at school.

Your child doesn't have these problems anywhere else BUT at school and is showing their ENTIRE azz.

You've punished, threatened and even spanked.

Nothing seems to help.

What do you do next?

*BLINK*

Mom ordered to stop baby-sitting friends' kids

What say you?

Question...

Would your 24 year old daughter have to hide the fact that she's living with a man from you?

Typing Lessons for the Kiddies!

Dance Mat Typing - Level 1

Single Mothers and Their Men

Should a single mother EVER live with a man she isn't married to? 

Kids: No to OBAMA..Yes to BUSH?

Kids Didn't Hear Obama, But Will Be Bussed for Bush

B'WHAT????????????????? 

**UPDATED** Here is the link with the email addresses of all the members of the Board of Trustees.  Please send them an email to voice what this means to you.  Don't start it with B'WHAT?????

WHEN I SAW THIS ISH VIA BELLADOMANI I WAS FLOORED...JUST FLOORED!  THEY ARE KIDDING ME WITH THIS SHIT RIGHT?  RIGHT?  THIS SHIT CANNOT BE GOING DOWN RIGHT?  RIGHT?

GOTDAMMIT I'M SO PISSED RIGHT NOW I'M SPITTING!

THOSE OF YOU IN ARLINGTON I HOPE YOU ARE ABOUT TO DIG INTO SOME AZZES WITH THE SWIFTNESS!

WOW.

JUST...WOW.

Monica "FLOORED, STUNNED" Ming

From PMichael: Sneaking Up on Daddy

Do your kids sneak up on you?  Did you ever do this to your parents?

Scenario...

Your girl is 43 years old.

Yall are out having sushi and saki.

She's single and has been for a while.

She tells you she's thinking about having a baby on her own and wants your opinion.

What do you tell her?

Scenario...

Your daughter turned 16.

For her birthday you purchased her a pair of diamond studs of good quality, and color.  Total weight is about a carat and a half.

You present them to her all proud of what you've done.

She doesn't like them. 

Why? 

They are round and set in gold when she wanted princess cut set in white gold or platinum.

What do you do?

What would YOUR parents have done?

Kiddie Mob

When you were a kid were you husky, slim or regular?  (I didn't know they still had husky clothes until yesterday and it brought back memories of my brothers and I school shopping with our mommy.  :))

What about your kids?  What's the difficulty you have in shopping for their clothes?  Are they tall but slim?  Short but husky?  Or are they pretty much true to sizes?

Mama Friend

Growing up...were you "friends" with your mother or was it a definite MAMA thing going on?

When did you get to be "friends" with your mother?

Are you "friends" with your children?

How do you successfully do this without it becoming a liability?

Question...

How do you handle when someone comes to your door to tell you that your child was misbehaving in public?  Has this ever gone wrong?

Scenario...

You and your ex are divorced.

You share custody of your 12 year old child.

The divorce was because of emotional and verbal abuse to you from your ex.

Your ex has your child on the weekends and every other  holiday.

Your holiday is coming up and you have made plans to take the child on a Disney cruise for the two of you and have paid for everything.

Your ex calls to ask you could they take the child for the upcoming holiday to go to Cancun with their entire family (lots of cousins of the same age) and you explain why you can't swap holidays.

You get into it and you end the call.

Your child is with your ex.

Your ex  brings your child home that evening on time.

Your child is upset.

You ask your child why and they tell you they wanted to go on vacation with your ex.

You explain to your child that arrangements have already been made and the money has already been spent and that, furthermore, something should have been said about this long ago for it to have been a viable option anyway.

Your child tells you that your ex said the only reason you are doing this is that you are a mean and vindictive bitch who doesn't want anyone to ever have fun or be happy.

Your child told you this VERBATIM.  WORD.BY.WORD.

What do you do?

Homeschooling

Could you do it?  What would be your reasons for doing so?  What would be your reasons for not doing it?

Acrylic Nails

What is the youngest you've seen with acrylic nails?  How old do YOU think a child should be before being allowed to get them?  Did your mother let YOU get acrylic nails?

Question...

If you were a retired grandparent and your child and their spouse had to both work out of the home...would you provide childcare for your grandchild during the day?  Or would you only do it sometimes because there is nothing wrong with daycare?  

Scenario...

You drop YOUR 15 year old off at the pool for open swim time.

You return at 5:30 pm when open swim time is over to pick your child up.

Your child is standing outside liplocked and groping with another teenager in front of EVERYONE!

What would YOU do?  Would you reaction vary if your child was a girl vs. a boy?

Scenario...

Your teenage daughter used to be outgoing.

Now all she wants to do is stay in her room.

She doesn't go anywhere.  She doesn't do anything.

She tells you nothing is wrong.

Her grades aren't suffering.

She doesn't want to talk to you.

She doesn't want to talk to her father.

She doesn't want to talk to a therapist.

This has been going on since February.

It's now June.

Do you take her to see someone against her will?

Daddy's Boy

 

Say your relationship with your son's father didn't make it.

He moved out of State for work after a while and was very upset because the move would take him away from his son.

You agreed that there will come a time when you will send your son to live with his father. 

His father is a good man and an excellent father so you know it will be a blessing for your son to have his father show him how to be a man by daily constant parenting/interaction.

At what age do you send your son to his father?

Tattling Vs. Snitching

I was talking to a girlfriend about children that kept tattling on each other.  Once we got off the phone I started wondering about tattling vs. snitching.  We teach our kids it's bad to tattle (we used to get beat if we tattled) but we want to make sure they don't get snitching with something confused as a BAD thing right?

I would think so.

Hmmmmm...

What say you on tattling vs. snitching?  How do you teach a kid one without worrying about the other later in his/her life.  Don't you WANT them to feel comfortable telling something that is against the rules or the law?

Hmmmmm...

Protected

Growing up I was never allowed to do a lot on my own.  Everything I did included one of my parents in very close vicinity.  Wasn't no dating, going to the mall with my girls, being hugged all up on the phone all hours of the night...none of that.

I went to school on the bus and returned on the bus unless my parents picked me up (they even picked me up on the bike once...SERIOUSLY).  After cheerleader practice I was picked up.  VERY rarely was I allowed to ride with someone else.  I never slept over at anyone's home and no one but an occasional cousin spent the night at our home.  My father usually always showed up at away games and I had a whole list of rules I knew were rules without them being uttered cuz I KNEW my parents.

And I knew they didn't play.

Yup...I was raised with fear as my compass and my tyrant of a father as my guide.

I always thought to myself that my childhood sucked ass as I compared my lack of freedom with those of my friends and I always said that when I was on my own I'd do this that and the other.

Turns out I didn't.  Turns out I kinda didn't like people all that much so I pretty much always only hung with my circle of friends. 

Turns out I didn't like crowds so I kinda stayed on the sidelines of much stuff anyway.  I was scared of what would jump off when I didn't have someone there to protect me cuz I was TRULY on.my.own.

Turns out my daddy knew what he was doing...kinda.  Turns out I knew I needed a protector to stay safe.

This morning I was watching GMA talk about teen girls and sans ropas.  I've heard it before, of course, but some things still shock me. 

I remember once hearing about some teenage girl on a school bus performing oral sans ropas on a teenage boy.  A bus full of kids.  I didn't want to believe it but I knew it was prolly true and that it prolly happened more often than not.  I thought about me on a school bus back in the day and how nothing like that would have ever happened to me because these things just didn't happen.

Or maybe they did and I just didn't know about it.

I don't think that I can honestly say that I'd be as hard on my children as my father was on us but sometimes I wonder if it's the only reason I didn't have a lot of the negative experiences regarding sans ropas as a teenager and young adult I've heard others say they had.  Sometimes I wonder if the only way to TRULY protect children is to never allow them the opportunity to mess up before they are old enough to understand they ARE messing up.

Sometimes I wonder if being a girl and raised as I was is the best way to raise a girl in this day and age.

Is freedom and allowing teenagers to make their own mistakes TRULY overrated?  Or do you think it's the best way to teach them how to fend for themselves?  Is it really wrong for children to feel they will always be protected because you will always be there?

When will YOU be comfortable loosening the reigns? 

Question...

Have you ever wished for rain so that your kid's sporting event was canceled?  Or is that only EVIL PARENTS WHO IMMA FIGHT?  ROFL!

Fun Parent

For your kids...who is the parent they know NOT to play with?  Who is the FUN parent?  Is there another person in your family they know to be on their p's and q's with?

From Tanyetta:

Tanyetta wants advice from you guys regarding how to best get DJ accustomed with his new baby sister.  As yall know...DJ is used to being the baby and he's not trying to give that title up lightly.

All good advice is welcome.

Paddling as punishment at school

Would you allow the school to paddle your child?

The Paddle and the Principal

Pretty Girls

If your daughter is one of those really pretty children who people are always remarking about how pretty she is...when do you start talking to her about looks and society?  do you ever?  Do you start warning her early on about how not to get caught up on looks or to be wary of people who are?  When do you sit with her and have the talk about how she might find herself dealing with more than her fair share of people who only want to be around her simply because of how she looks?

Or...do you just let it roll and never bring it up because in doing so it might bring more attention to her thinking about it?

Hmmmmm....

What do you think about raising a daughter to think that while a man needs to always work to provide..it should be optional for the woman when she marries?

In this day and age...is this unrealistic and therefore would be a handicap to your daughter?

Hmmmm.....

Your VERY well developed and attractive 14 year old daughter has just been asked to the prom by a 17 year old senior.

Do you let her go?

As a WOMAN...

What advice would you have for another woman who was raising a daughter without benefit of a father and who didn't want her daughter to have any perceived "daddy issues?"

When you were a teenager...

Did you ever take your mother and/or father THERE?  You know...that place where you thought they were SERIOUSLY about to kill your azz?

Has either of your children taken YOU there yet? 

Child Endangerment? What say YOU?

Lawyer Madlyn Primoff in trouble with the law after passing point where parents snap

Daycare

How old was your child when they went to daycare? 

How did you find your daycare provider? 

What would you do?

Your 16 year old son asks you to buy him condoms.

Your 16 year old daughter asks you to go on birth control.

Question...

Are your kids good students?

Question...

Do you think your children would be afraid to come and talk to you if they thought they'd contracted an STD?

Would you have been able to talk to your parents about it after your first sans ropas encounter if you thought something was amiss?

Boxeria

Would you support your teenage daughter being a boxer?

What is YOUR favorite...

...thing to do with your children?

Chow Down

Do you let your kids eat in the car?

Due Date

Did your baby arrive before, on or after your due date?

Scenario...

You work at a plant.

Yall have to alternate shifts every quarter.

It's your quarter to work the overnight shift.

When you work this shift your mother spends the night at your home.

You get a call from a friend of yours who has had to take a part time job at the 24 hour WalMart.

The friend just saw your 15 year old daughter in the store with a couple of other teenagers after midnight.

Your daughter didn't see the friend.

What do you do?