Challenges

That's what I've been faced with lately. No, "faced with" isn't exactly the term. "Shoved in my face" would be more appropriate! Each kid brings a different challenge.

The challenge with Mabry is supporting her dream without squashing it with reality. She wants to be on stage, loves it, craves it. But she needs money, too, and for some reason colleges and community theatre just don't pay her to be on stage! We've got to somehow find a balance between supporting her dream and supporting HER! As in, we don't want to be supporting her when she's 30 years old! This means sacrificing some of her time on stage to get a (gasp!)
J. O. B. Sometimes I wish we were the kind of enabling parents that would let our kids do whatever they want, indulge their every whim, to see them happy. I'm sure they'd LOVE that! But that's not adult life, and both Mabry and Pete are about to be adults so they need to know this stuff!

With Pete, the challenge is reining in his free spirit without breaking it. Good grief, I've never encountered such a spirit as his! He wants to fly free, be a kid, have no worries....and I'd love that for him. Unfortunately, he's almost not a kid anymore and must learn to take care of himself. This means money management, and quite frankly he's not interested, thanks very much! Pete's problem with money is not that it burns a hole in his pocket; it burns a hole in his heart! He MUST get rid of it as soon as he gets it or he will surely die! (sigh)

Our challenge with Ryan is fairly straight-forward right now, a simple yes or no. When he wakes up each morning with that surly attitude, we ask ourselves, "Do we let him live another day?" So far the answer has been "yes", but should this blog ever stop suddenly, you'll know we changed our minds! :)*