Fun Outdoor Halloween Decoration

We have two large trees in our front yard and for years I have strung a giant spiderweb between them for a Halloween decoration. If you don't have trees that are accommodatingly placed, the top of the web can be attached to the eaves of your house, but if you do it this way, the shape would be more rectangular. Any kind of thin rope will work. Each year when I take the web down, I loosely tie together the long tails that wrap around each tree; the next year, I don't have to start from scratch and the web isn't in a tangled mess(it took me a few years to figure out this trick). Please don't look at the patchy grass in these photos - we have wonderful, huge shade trees, but they are murder (literally) on bermuda grass and our Oklahoma heat makes growing shade grass a challenge.  My poor husband is constantly fighting this losing battle - the elements always win.

To make your web: tie four lengths of rope between the two trees, then tie five pieces of rope to the middle of the rope at the top. Each of these five pieces will radiate out to form the downward spokes of the web. Tie each one around the horizontal ropes as it goes down. Make a loop at the end of each of the radiating pieces and slip a metal stake (I use a coat hanger snipped into shorter lengths and bent into a crook at one end) through the loop and into the ground to anchor it. Then, cut long pieces of rope and, starting at the top horizontal piece, tie it to each line you pass, making the third layer on the web. Add a large, plastic spider (mine has an elastic loop that I use to attach it to the web) and you have a cool outdoor Halloween decoration. Happy haunting!!

Motivating children who refuse to obey

We were sitting at dinner the other night and my youngest son told us about a conversation he overheard at his school the other day.  He's a senior in high school and he overheard the policeman assigned to the school talking to a parent.  This mother was saying that she just couldn't get her son, a freshman, to get up in the morning and go to school.  She lamented that he was much bigger than she was and there was no way she could force him.  The Boxman and I just laughed.  There are always ways to make your children do what they don't want to do; if they are balking at obeying you, you just have to find out what motivates them.  When number 2 son was potty training, he wouldn't do his business.  He wanted to go play at the next-door neighbor's house with his brother and I told him he couldn't go until he had used the toilet.  He accomplished that lickety-split. When my daughter first started driving, she had a very difficult time remembering to put the garage door down when she left the house, a big problem if she left the house open to anyone happening by.  We finally took her keys for a few days - she never forgot again. Sometimes it's difficult to find out what motivates a child and might require a lot of thought. The motivation can be positive rather than punitive, too, but I wouldn't reward a child for getting up and going to school.  Some things we do because it's expected, not because of a reward.
The best parents find creative ways to meet new dilemmas.

It All Begins Somewhere

For me, it began 25 years ago when I married my wonderful husband, the Boxman. He was duly warned...I told him the night we met that I wanted four kids so he went into this adventure with his eyes wide open. It's been fun and crazy, frustrating at times, but always exactly where I wanted to be. I've often thought how unfair it is that we only get one pass through life and we are stumbling through it most of the time, especially when it comes to raising kids. There are too many mistakes to make them all on your own so this is my attempt to pass on what I've learned. It will have tips on raising kids, on how to run a well-oiled machine of a house, some recipes and anything else I think might be helpful. Now you ask, what qualifies you to do this and expect that I'll want to listen? Just 25 years in the trenches, raising four children who have turned out amazingly well, sometimes because of my husband and me, but more often in spite of us. I hope you find some nugget that helps you as you nurture your family because when your children are grown (or almost grown) and you really like the people that they have become, it seems that nothing on earth matters so much.