You may not be aware of this, but moms can roll their eyes at their kids just as well as their kids do at them. The mom eye roll seems to peak somewhere in the middle school years. Personally, this is one of my favorite age groups. They are “grown” enough to begin thinking independently, but still innocent enough to get excited about things. Many parents and teachers would disagree with me, however!
As a result, I am always looking for a great resource to suggest to parents of tween girls. (For some reason, the boys at this age don’t seem to bother parents and teachers as much.). I recently had a chance to look at a new book She’s Almost a Teenager: Essential Conversations to Have Now
The authors take time to discuss the eight conversations they believe parents should have with girls before they enter the teen years. They cover all of the basics from friends to physical changes to faith to boys and more. Each chapter breaks the topic down into the concerns you as a parent may have as well as the position or ideas your child may have. They do a good job of walking through the things that should be included in each conversation and end each chapter with several broad discussion questions to ask your child.
It happened again today. The morning shows on television were trumpeting the results of some new study “proving” the quality of the time spent with children is more important than the quantity of time. These sorts of reports and studies circulate periodically, reassuring over scheduled, working parents their children will be “just fine” with the few minutes of time a day most spend with them.
Ever known someone who insisted on doing the very thing that irritates you the most? Maybe he called you by a nickname you hated or she always teased you about the way you pronounced a certain word. You may love the person, but whenever you were around them you kept waiting for them to push your buttons in some way to get a reaction from you. Even now, thinking about it makes you cringe just a little.