RedHead Confetti

“Most parents today were brought up in a culture that put a strong emphasis on being special,” [Madeline Levine] observes. “Being special takes hard work and can’t be trusted to children. Hence the exhausting cycle of constantly monitoring their work and performance, which in turn makes children feel less competent and confident, so that they need even more oversight.” ( page 2 , emphasis added) I saw a little blurb at Slate on Monday, and then Wednesday- another one at Jezebel. So I got off my ass and went over to the New Yorker to read this article, “ Spoiled Rotten, Why do children rule the roost?” I've said before that I'm not the best parent. I don't helicopter, I don't over-play or schedule; I don't ask, actually. I tell. I don't look at my children as friends of mine. In fact, not one of them would be someone I would choose to be friends with. They're too young, to immature, and their world-views, while larger than their peers, is ...

Friday night, about ten pm for you on the East Coast, the jury came back with a verdict in the trial of The People versus Jerry Sandusky [I'm not sure if Pennsylvania lists their cases as The People of <insert county here>, so bear with me.] You can see a breakdown of the charges and verdicts, here . CNN did an excellent job of covering the story. I followed that trial so closely, that I dreamed about it! I know I'm not the only person so involved in it; I'd venture to say the world was riveted at times. Such is the nature of sexual assault cases involving children-- look at the fall out from the repeated, institutionalised rape and abuse of children by the Roman Catholic clergy-- we want to protect children from such evils, and when they're abused anyway, we all feel like we're watching a train crash... we just can't look away, no matter how revolted, angered and sick we feel. This might have been different than the “usual” sensational tri...

Quick note: I recently stumbled across a blog by a gent in the UK who was raised fundie-- he's writing about what he learned, lived through and what fundies believe. You might, if you're interested, take a peek. I have enjoyed reading his blog ( Leaving Fundamentalism ) so far, and his upcoming book (that I don't know the name of) is on my list of Books To Get! He doesn't know I'm linking back to him, so this isn't a link-for-link thing. I just wanted to share a good read. He's done an excellent job of explaining the weird craziness that fundies put themselves and their brains through-- far better than I could do, I think. Anyway, on to the blog. Last week I read an article on Jezebel that linked back to Good As You and mentioned Focus on the Family. I don't like FotF, for many many reasons. I grew up listening to their radio programs. They were on the Christian Radio channel my mother's radio was glued to, 24/7. For a time, FotF ...

My youngest son is eight years old. He has been in speech therapy since Kindergarten, and every year we have to meet with the Speech teacher to go over the IEP for next year. The IEP, or Individualised Education Program, is a fancy way of saying, "here's where the kid is, here's where we want them to be, and here's how we're getting there". That's it, that's all, it's very simple. So, every year, around about May, just as school's letting out, I go see the SLP (that'd be Speech and Language Pathologist. I've been blessed to have an SLP at both his elementary schools). Some times the physical therapist is present-- as it's pretty standard to work to improve children's fine motor control as they work on their speech. For my son, working with his fine motor has helped him voice his missing sounds, so I would guess that it's that way for many kids. I'd spoken to his SLP a couple times, as this was his first year in the S...

  Trigger Warning: This blog deals with my thoughts and feelings stemming from a news story about a man murdering the molester/rapist of his daughter. I briefly discuss vigilantism, and self-defence. It's not a deep blog, but it's sorta all over, meanders a bit, and might be difficult to read if you're the victim of molestation or rape. If you have been abused, please seek help. See your school counsellor, call the police, or go to the hospital. You don't have to face it alone, and there are people who can and want to, help you. About a week ago a father in Texas beat a man to death. We heard about it, nationwide, because he walked in on a man molesting the man's daughter. Like most parents, the man freaked out and intervened. The molester was beaten to death-- one of those almost trite "beaten about the head and shoulders" things. The father was very contrite, and seemed to feel genuinely sorry for killing the man. As of last Friday, the gra...

My house runs on solar power. It's a new thing, we just finally turned it on, and it was installed the first and second week of May. This wasn't a sudden decision, it was something I've wanted for close on to a decade now. I always said when I bought my house I wanted solar panels on it. Even if I was up north, where the sun isn't as constantly visible as it is down here, I knew even a handful of panels would help generate electricity for my home. I also thought maybe one of the smaller wind gennies, but that was something I kicked around more than thought seriously about. I know it sounds trite. That doesn't make it any less true, that I have always wanted to leave the world in a better state than it was when I got it; PV panels is one way I can do that. Sustainability is important to me, and getting off coal is one way I can do that. Making my own electricity seemed like a no-brainer to me. My husband and I talked solar to death. We knew we w...