Bates Parenting and Musings

We have finally reached the point of no return in our house by giving Raquel, our 16 year old a smart phone. For about two years now, she has used Gabb Wireless, (www.gabbwireless.com) We were pretty comfortable here. She could talk on the phone and text. Only words, no pictures, the picture quality was horrible, and it did not acces the internet so social media was not even an issue. We patted ourselves on the back for finding this solution, and then we got comfortable. Knowing all the while that eventually, we would have to give in and let her have a smart phone, if for nothing else than to practice safe usage while still under our roof, but also for maps as she is a newer driver and could not find her way out of a paper sack! It is one of the things I am proud to say she gets from me! (More on that later.) So there we were, Christmas morning. She had opened all of her gifts and there was still one small box under the tree. After all of her siblings opened their gifts, we bro...

Bribes,Bribes and more Bribes! See this cheesy smile? Man, she is one tough cookie! She cried all day from the day she was born until she turned about 18 months old. We lovingly referred to her as a terrorist! She really just struggled, and so did we. She is number 6 and we are experienced parents, but is there such a thing? I swear that she taught us so much. I still can't believe we agreed to have one more after her. Seriously! It was THAT H.A.R.D. I'm fairly certain that this is when my over bribing began. I would beg her and promise the world if she would just not scream while we grocery shopped, or picked the other kids up at school. I totally know she did not understand me, but for some reason, it made me feel like I was trying to make things better for her. "If you stop crying, I will give you a cookie." "If you stay in bed and don't get out, tomorrow you can have pancakes for breakfast....