I also realize at my age, I need more help around the home then what I use to. I’m not as young as a lot of women raising children my age. Matter of fact, I’m grandma age, they're half the age. I have to admit after being a foster parent and adoptive parent, I had to learn to be just as tough as them. I had to become thick skinned. And not let things hurt my feelings, but realize. I am a creation of God and he wants me to live a blessed life. I am a wife and mother and grandmother that deserves respect. So don’t get mad at me for telling you to do your chores, be glad that you have a mother that makes sure that you never go to bed hungry. Be glad that you have a mother that takes time to be sure that you do things right. Be glad that you have a mother that makes sure that you have nice clothes to wear to school and at church. No, I don’t buy designer clothes. If you want designer clothes get a job and learn how to work. I’m not being mean to you. I’m teaching you responsibility. I want to make sure when you grow-up that you have the knowledge how to keep your home clean. I want to make sure that you know how to fix a meal, and do it right. I want you to know that you can live a blessed life too, by treating others good, but not with anger. Understand the difference between being punished and learning responsibility. I was shocked when one of their friends came over and said. “I don’t have to do chores, we eat out of paper plates every day.” “I don’t wash dishes every day.” It’s hard to teach my kids responsibility when other parents aren’t doing the same thing. We aren’t on the same page. I’m not disabling my kids. I’m enabling them. I hope other parents are enablers and not disablers. I want my kids to be productive producers in all that they do from being able to make soap to cleaning a home and making a home cooked meal. We may have different expectations for our children, but I expect mine to do the best they can do, at everything, they do! If they can, I know as a parent that we were successful in teaching them to raise the next generation. If not, we failed as a parent.
Proverbs 22:6 Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it.
Patricia Kelley