Sometimes, I come across so very touching advertisements.  Although this one is in a language that I can’t understand, it touched my heart and made me cry.

Share some of your advertisements in which you have cried or almost or just touched your heart.

My old Scouter friend from Hertfordshire occasionally sends me collections of ‘funnies’ he’s come across in his travels and this except from kids writing about the sea just made me laugh so much – I had to share.

What’s made you laugh today? An email from an old friend or something a child said (or anything else in between of course)?

If you are surrounded by sea you are an Island ….. If you don’t have sea all round you, you are incontinent.
( Wayne age 7)

Sharks are ugly and mean, and have big teeth, just like Emily R ichardson …. She’s not my friend no more.
(Kylie age 6)

When ships had sails, they used to use the trade winds to cross the ocean. Sometimes, when the wind didn’t blow, the sailors would whistle to make the wind come. My brother said they would be better off eating beans.
(William age 7)

I’m not going to write about the sea. My baby brother is always screaming and being sick, my Dad keeps shouting at my Mum, and my big sister has just got pregnant, so I can’t think what to write..
(Amy age 6)

and my personal favourite – somewhere there’s a mortified mum….
On holiday my Mum went water skiing. She fell off when she was going very fast. She says she won’t do it again because water shot up her XXXXX.
(Julie age 7)

It’s getting close to Christmas Holidays for my kids here in Canada. And every day it seems like there is always a Christmas craft that comes home. I love that they do so many things in December, it really is one of my favourite times. So this week a letter to Santa came home and it was so cute that I had to share it. (Keep in mind that he is in Grade 1.)

Dear Santa,

santa claus I love you

How are your reindeer doing?

I want spike the dinosaur Please

Yours truly, Ty

I was so happy to see he had such good manners! And I’m so happy that he only picked one present instead of a million. This is the first Christmas for me in the whole time I have been living from my parents that I don’t have to worry about money. It makes this time a little less stressful. I have always worried that we wouldn’t even be able to afford a turkey most years. Even last year we had to make a trip to the food bank to get food during the holidays. It’s funny how the season has become how much money you have. This year will be so much sweeter because I don’t have to worry.
Do you have everything done and planned for the holidays?

This morning here in the U.K, I made a particularly early start as I needed to leave early to attend my daughters parents evening teacher consultation.

Sarah Kennedy was on the radio (Radio 2) and long a champion of kids say the funniest things, she still receives mail from parents and grandparents alike mortifying teenagers and older ones with tales of when they were young.

This mornings made me smile in particular so I though I’d share – imagine the scene – a small boy and his mother sitting on a bus. On the seat in front of them, a bald man and next to him another man with one of those ’70′s hairstyles with hair up to the ceiling.

The little boy said in a rather loud voice “Mummy, you’d think they’d share the hair!”.

Well I’m sure, particularly if you’re a parent, there are moments when you’d just love the ground to open up and swallow you quickly and if you’re not a parent, then chances are you’ve still had the odd moment when you’d gladly fall down a crack in the pavement!

So do tell – what was your ‘ground opening’ moment?

So it’s been almost two weeks since my youngest son started grade one. And I still feel like my heart has been ripped out. My son was in half days of kindergarten last year. I could handle that. He would be gone for half the day and I wouldn’t miss him at all. But during the summer my son and I would talk about how he would be gone all day and it would be okay. We both weren’t so sure about it.

I have never been away from my son (except for when I was in the hospital) since I stopped working at 30 weeks pregnant. I wanted him to go to school but at the same time I didn’t. I have never been alone without kids since I was 15. I helped raise my brother and then when he was 5, I had my daughter.

When he gets on the school bus in the morning he gives me these puppy dog eyes like he is going off to jail or something. But, when he gets home he tells me all about his fun day. When he came back from his first day he gave me this piece of paper…I looked down and saw his hand print on it. There was also this poem that said…

When you really miss me, and don’t know what to do, Just press my hand right to your cheek, And know I love you.

Talk about making me cry. I held it in though. But I am sure he knew I loved it.

I was at the mall the other day…ALONE…for the first time…and it was a really weird feeling. I saw so many pregnant women and stay at home moms that had their toddlers with them. My heart started to ache as I  missed my shopping buddy.

I’m sure this feeling will go away…but I keep thinking…what’s it going to be like when he goes away to college. I really finally know how it feels for my mom and why she was so upset to see me move so far away from home. Being a parent never ends. Now I know that!

*BTW -- that pic up there?  That's yours truly and the middle child when he had his sr. photo's done.  

Arvind here reflecting on a stunning image he was sent yesterday as part of a chain email.

The photo is the 1994 “Pulitzer Prize” winning photo, taken in 1993 during the Sudan famine. The picture depicts a famine stricken child crawling towards a United Nations food camp.

The vulture is waiting for the child to die so that it can eat it. This picture shocked the whole world. And though various stories have arisen about this picture, no one knows what happened to the child, including the photographer Kevin Carter who supposedly left the place as soon as the photograph was taken.

Three months later, Kevin Carter committed suicide due to depression, supposedly brought about by his various experiences as a photojournalist around South Africa and other places.

A picture paints a thousand words and 15 years after this picture was taken, parts of the world are still ravaged by famine whereas there is an abundance of food elsewhere. The chain email I received aimed to get one to stop complaining about food and wasting it.

Indeed some recent statistics in the UK showed that we waste around a quarter of all the food we buy! This has obvious huge implications for food production, distribution, carbon emissions, wasted resources, packaging etc. And I am sure for other nations such as the USA, the figure for food wastage must be around the same, if not higher.

So what does an image like this do for you? Are we doing enough for such children around the world?

And do you complain or waste food yourself? If so, when will you stop?

This is my first post ever on my new laptop…but that story later. My youngest child’s last day of school was today…he’s now going to be in Grade 1! Now, I remember this day with my daughter and she’s already in Grade 6! I tell you life goes so quickly…and before you know it, life is over!

Being a parent has it’s challenges too. I’ll tell you what they are thinking of doing in Canada. They want to pass a law that makes parents get charged if they spank their child. Just a tap…they will get charged with assault. And just the other week a girl, 12, (which is the age of my daughter) sued her father because he grounded her from a field trip. And she won! Something isn’t right with this world when they want children to think they rule the world. It’s wrong!

What is a crazy rule they have in your country??

My children will be off of school next week. (And as you can see from the picture my son is super happy!!) And I think I am going to go crazy! I think they are so funny…this week is an example.

My kids have wanted a Nintendo DS so they could be like all the other kids in school. I thought it would be a good idea for the summer so they wouldn’t get bored. But, of course, after playing one game for an hour they were.

It kills me to think that they wanted this thing for so long…and then got tired of it so quickly.

I try to tell my kids to always have something you want…if you always get everything you want you will have nothing to strive for. It’s not always a good thing to get things just handed to you. There is always a great satisfaction in getting there yourself. Things may be tough…but when you get there it’s that much sweeter.

What are you striving for?

Oh what a Garden we live in!
It is beautiful, wonderful, full of caring and kind people, fascinating creatures, wonder and surprises, but at the same time it is a scary, cruel, terrifying and testing place to survive in.

Something I find rather amusing, in a totally ironic way, is how news travels. You know if something bad has happened to Joe Blog up the road then you will hear about it before poor Joe can say shhhh! On the other hand if its good news it could be days, weeks or never before you hear about it.
Why is this So? I mean shouldn’t we want to hear about the all things which happen to folks out there and shun the bad and horrific deeds others do.

The evening news is the most frightening and violent show on Television, yet it is on during general viewing times when most of us are enjoying dinner. Images of accidents, wars, starving children, murder victims all there in our lounge rooms. Programs which present a love scenes, being a caring and helpful person in a positive way etc (not the naughty stuff) are sent to times after 8.30 when children are normally in bed, yet cartoons, movies and many other programs which portray violence are permitted as general viewing.

An example of what I mean consider this: A movie comes on the telly Harry Potter Goblet of Fire its viewing time is 7.30pm, so the littlies are able to watch. I and Moppet are huge Harry Potter fans BTW. The movie progresses through its normal, dark story line and comes to climax just short of the end, you see the bad guys Voldemort as a helpless creature, Harrys’ friend is murdered, Voldemort’s minder cuts his hand off, slice Harry arm with a sharp blade whilst Harry is restrained and a magical battle follows. When Harry returns to Hogwarts with his dead friends body, he is taken by another bad guy Moody to his office, subject to various nasty little events etc … you get the idea great viewing for the 5-8 year olds its aimed at, don’t think good old fashioned family viewing.

But then the next week a Movie Sweet November which is actually relatively a calm, loving movie about relationships, quirky girl and her desire to teach people how to enjoy life and not become so wrapped up in the importance of their jobs that they loose sight of the importance of living life, to see life as a wonderful adventure one which we should take hold of with both hands and run with. Is viewed at 8.30pm when the littlies have gone to bed.

I understand the need for heroes in ours and our children’s lives, the need for adventure in an otherwise boring time. But is only this way because we have been conditioned to believe that someone else has the responsibility of entertaining us, keeping our mind on the go, and teaching moral and ethics to our children.

My point is are we teaching our children the value of life and how to make the most of the time they have on this earth(regardless of your faith) or are we forming them into a consumer driven desensitised group who are more used to seeing the use violence and attending counseling rather than well balanced caring people who find the use of violence a sickening prospect.

What do you think?

Is this trend a danger to the next generation or this all blown out of proportion, after its not as if crimes involving kids is on the increase is it!