My best birthday was probably the one I celebrated in Venice the year we went to Italy, because Venice! It was very nice, the tour guide had the restaurant make me a cake and all these people I had just met the week before bought me little presents.

{{{Suzi}}} My dad's favorite phrase when I got hung up on "fair" was "fair is for five year olds." I hope you and CJ can work it out.

Bedtime Bear and Fuzzy Monkey.

Owen insisted on wearing the costume out to eat and I had to fight with him to get it off to take a bath. He wanted to sleep in it. *sigh*

Cashmere, you have such beautiful children. The look especially cute in their costumes.

{{hugs to everyone}}

Suzi -- I don't know CJ well enough to know if you should now keep your mouth shut or go back to him. But here are some questions for him : He knew he was doing wrong- was it fair that he got the teacher involved in correcting what he all ready knew was wrong? Is it fair that you had to even talk to him about something that he knew was wrong. Is it fair that he made you ( or the entire household) upset. Then let him know - it is time for him to make a choice - a hard choice - and an adult choice. He can chose to be a mean cruel bully. that is the easy choice. or he can work to become the kind generous man that you see in him. and you'll help him, because you know how hard it is.

I don't have kids. and I don't know CJ that well, but I don't think he a bully. But I think that letting him know that it matters, and it is his choice - helps.

my dad used to say "fair is a kid's word" . As a child I figured out that this meant " Life isn't fair" ,but this still didn't mean I had the right to be unkind, cruel or even - unfair.

can you tell this is an issue for me?

ION, we got something from fast track( bridgetoll) today - a violation - the partial plate is close - but the back end of the car-not our car. and our car - would have been no where near the bridge on that day. I really hope this doesn't become a pain in the ass to fight.

For balance - a good CJ story.

I have talked about how he finally started whipping through the Harry Potter books, reading 5, 6, and 7 just since school started. He finished book seven two nights ago and started reading Holes last night.

So, finished Holes tonight and wants another book (he has been banned from the computer and the tv for now). K-Bug isn't home, so we just have the adult bookshelf to choose from at the moment (not THAT kind of adult books). He chose Raising the Titanic by Clive Cussler.

CJ sounds like a good kid. I hope he smartens up about the other stuff.

Aww, Cashmere, they're adorable!

beth - I did touch on much of what you suggested, from a slightly different angle, but still, same ideas.

I also drew some other parallels and had him look at his behavior from a different viewpoint.

Luckily his teacher really likes him so I can also point out that he has someone on his side and this behavior stuff is ALL HIM. She e-mails me, so we have good lines of communication.

I also reminded him that part of the reason we get so upset is that we KNOW he knows how to act right. It makes stuff like this so much worse.

I figured you did, suzi. and CJ is a good kid.

has he read Among the Hidden ?

[link]

my new favorite author. running out of Time by Haddix was really good too. She write kid's books that are too hard for me to put down. In among the hidden the main character is a third child in a world where only two kids are allowed. Really well done - I need to get the second book. and - just as a BTW, this kid's life is not fair.