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“Prayer Is Positively Powerful”—Unborn Baby Has Over 90% Chance of Dying, Floors Doctors as Living, Breathing Miracle

The baby's condition was 'off the charts bad'. It was so extreme that the specialists stopped measuring and monitoring his fluid level because, at that point, it didn't really matter. The MRI's were sickening to look at.

“I’m Married to Someone I Don’t Truly Know”: Woman Gets Engaged to Husband Twice After Traumatic Memory Loss

"I felt like I was stuck in a hazy nightmare I couldn’t escape. For 2 years, I spent every waking moment in tear-jerking, white-knuckled pain."

Mom Urges Parents to See This X-Ray After Family BBQ Lands Her Son in the ER

“It was the most awful and difficult 24 hours of my life watching my son in so much pain, not being able to do anything to make it better and know that this could have been 100% avoidable."

Quit Doing These 8 Things for Your Teen This School Year if You Want to Raise an Adult

How do we raise competent adults if we’re always doing everything for our kids?

Don’t judge me if you happen to see my kids eating packaged Ritz crackers for school lunch.

Don’t judge me if they’re on the sidelines of PE because they forgot their uniform.

Don’t judge me if they didn’t turn in their homework because it’s still sitting home on their desk.

What some may view as a lack of parenting, is what I deem parenting on purpose, as we work to build necessary life skills in our kids.

I stopped making daily breakfasts and packing school lunches long ago.

I don’t feel obligated to deliver forgotten items left behind at home.

School projects and homework are not any part of my existence.

How do we raise competent adults if we’re always doing everything for our kids?

8 Things You Should Stop Doing For Your Teenager:

1. Waking them up in the morning

If you are still waking little Johnny up in the mornings, it’s time to let an alarm clock do its job. My foursome has been expected to get themselves up on early school mornings since they started middle school. There are days one will come racing out with only a few minutes to spare before they have to be out the door. The snooze button no longer feels luxurious when it’s caused you to miss breakfast.

I heard a Mom actually voice out loud that her teen sons were just so cute still, that she loved going in and waking them up every morning. Please stop. I find my sons just as adorable as you do, but our goal is to raise well-functioning adults here.

2. Making their breakfast and packing their lunch

My morning alarm is the sound of the kids clanging cereal bowls. My job is to make sure there is food in the house so that they can eat breakfast and pack a lunch.

One friend asked, yeah but how do you know what they’re bringing for school lunch? I don’t. I know what food I have in my pantry and it’s on them to pack up what they feel is a good lunch. It will only be a few short years and I will have no idea what they are eating for any of their meals away at college. Free yourself away from the PB and J station now.

Amy Carney
Amy Carneyhttp://amycarney.com
A former sports journalist and editor, Amy Carney currently writes on her blog www.amycarney.com as well as for various online and print outlets about intentional parenting and family life. Amy and her husband, Keith, are busy raising teenage triplet sons, a subsequent teen daughter and a son they adopted from foster care.

“Prayer Is Positively Powerful”—Unborn Baby Has Over 90% Chance of Dying, Floors Doctors as Living, Breathing Miracle

The baby's condition was 'off the charts bad'. It was so extreme that the specialists stopped measuring and monitoring his fluid level because, at that point, it didn't really matter. The MRI's were sickening to look at.

“I’m Married to Someone I Don’t Truly Know”: Woman Gets Engaged to Husband Twice After Traumatic Memory Loss

"I felt like I was stuck in a hazy nightmare I couldn’t escape. For 2 years, I spent every waking moment in tear-jerking, white-knuckled pain."

Mom Urges Parents to See This X-Ray After Family BBQ Lands Her Son in the ER

“It was the most awful and difficult 24 hours of my life watching my son in so much pain, not being able to do anything to make it better and know that this could have been 100% avoidable."