Work Makes Way on Easter Weekend

Steve and Me

When families rally together, families stay strong and gets things done.

Steve Jr.

Sean

Natalie


When a family supports each other, they keep relationships happy and healthy.

Are the Best Things in Life Free?

Are the best things in life really free?

Don't you love that saying, "the best things in life are free"? Whoever came up with that one had everything or didn't care to lift a finger to get there; missing the point altogether.

Listen, I think the best things in life are the things that we work hard to accomplish through sacrifice, and those things are even sweeter in the end when we do reach a difficult and important goal in life. Sometimes that goal may be the goal of a loved one. Sometimes that goal seems insurmountable. But when people work together even the most impossible can transform into a reality.

Teaching our children a tenet like this carries them through when times get tough in their relationships, at school, and in work.

"Life is hard," my Dad told me this when we realized we were going to lose him to cancer. My heart was breaking and there was no fixing that reality. There is still a little hole in my day where we used to share a few precious moments over coffee.

But his words always come to mind when life tests us. Somehow they empower and they comfort at the same time.

He was right, life is hard and anything worthwhile requires blood, sweat, and tears to go with it.

I used to help my Dad when I was a girl, he was a mason by trade, and I would lug bricks for him or mix cement when he'd let me. We'd stop at the local general store on our way to his job site and he'd buy me a birch beer and he'd get a black coffee.  I never even thought about an allowance or getting paid, I just enjoyed being with him and at the end of the day I always felt fulfilled, very tired, but happily productive.

I realize how my help was more important than Dad wanted to let on, we did not have a lot materially when I was growing up as the oldest of four children who were constantly eating and wearing out their shoes, with a stay at home mom, for the most part.

A few months ago the company my husband worked for closed their doors on a Tuesday morning. My husband was counting on a check that would not come. You can't get blood from a stone, as the saying goes.

For the past few days I've been working alongside my children to help their father finish the project he was in the midst of when all this happened.

 It would have been easy for my husband to walk away and play the blame game but instead he has pushed through many roadblocks to honor a contract with a customer caught in the middle of a bad economy.

"It's a good thing you and Dad had a lot of children," said our oldest daughter who just smiled and called her siblings into action stations when I folded under the pressure of everything that comes along with 90% of your family business depending on the kind of company that sends everyone home with your hard-earned money on a Tuesday morning because it was all they could do.

My heart was breaking for my husband,  but our daughter could see the possibilities. I was grateful that we as her  parents had  instilled her with the ethic of blood, sweat, and tears.

So we all gave up our weekend; our 27-year-old daughter giving up her Easter with her husband and our one-year-old grandson, our 25-year-old son giving up his Easter with his wife and our two-year-old grandson, our 21-year-old son giving up band practice and time with friends and our  23-year-old daughter giving up time off work to take care of our grandson back  home so that we could all rally around Dad (Hubby) as a family. And he truly is the hub of the family.

The best things in life are not free, but they are worth fighting for.

As for me, I am going to remember that the next time I am having a bad day.

Bon :)

Good Luck! Good Parenting!!

Patience is a virtuosa

My daughter Jillian  filling out the documents for copyrighting her art collection, "Babies in Bloom".

Anything worthwhile requires a ton of hard work and patience.

I think those who are so offended by Amy Chua's tiger mother approach should sit down and read the book. You'll laugh, you'll cry, you'll raise an eyebrow, and you'll learn something.

In a televised interview, her daughters Sophia and Lulu, didn't seem to mind that their mother pushed them so hard. Kudos to Amy for believing in her daughters. And they excelled, but not without a lot of hard work and some heartache thrown in for good measure.

Amy professes in the book that she worries if her daughters will like her when she's old and gray, but she's willing to make that sacrifice for their success at the piano and the violin, and of course in school. And they do!

Amy is brave and far from lazy and her daughters reap the rewards. Her take is that third generation immigrants can make sacrifices like their parents and grandparents only through time spent on music practice. Yes, three hours a day, every day, vacation or no vacation. That's true grit. 

I am so tired of hearing, "I've already said that, and my child doesn't do it."

What they really mean is: "I don't believe in you."

Those are the parents who barely lift a finger and hope for the best, which they think is going to happen through osmosis, a miracle, or an alien abduction. Hello! Anything worthwhile takes patience and persistence. You know, the roll up your sleeves kind of patience.

And if a parent wants a child to succeed in school, at an instrument, and in life, a parent needs to be ready, willing, and able to get in the trenches alongside their child as well. End of story; or beginning, depending on which side you decide to take a stand.

Parents, stop whining, and start doing; you' re setting a bad example for your kids. Be prepared to say it over and over, it's called consistency, and it's known as good parenting.

All of you out there who are appalled by Amy Chua's parenting style should should look at your own results.

Let's stop acting like we all have an American inferiority complex and get to work. What was it the comedian Lisa Lampenelli said? Oh yes, "no complain, no explain."
Come on, isn't your child worth it?

If you want excellence you're going  to have to expect excellence, period.
If you want losers, keep acting like a loser.

Like my husband used to tell the kids when they got an A-,
"Oh, I see there's still room for improvement!" He was right.

And if I hear the self-esteem argument one more time I might just growl. We wonder why kids are dropping like flies all around us, we can barely let them do anything too stressful. Making their own peanut butter and jelly sandwich is not a stressful endeavor. Beside which some stress is good.

 I say Amy is  a brave mother! If Amy wants to parent the Asian way then let her, it's obviously working out for her girls. Have you seen the statistics?

Don't get me wrong, we need diversity in the world, we can't all be virtuosos, and it's hard work being a tiger mom.

Still, I envy her heritage.

But it's never too late. Stop slamming someone else's accomplishments and start believing in what your child can do, right now, and then keep going with it.

Patience is a virtuosa or two, and that is that.

"Cherry Twins", in pastel and pencil, part of the collection by Jillian Toomey.