Parenting Teens

And Then There Will Be Three Monday, 22 March 2010 21:12 Written by Melisa with one s

Well hello, stranger! (or should you be saying that to me?) It's been a long (and busy) few months: we've had an Eagle Scout Court of Honor and we've been doing the college search, and I've been working on my book, yada yada yada. Through it all, "get a Dad Blogs column up" has been on my to-do list. I thought that, before I ended up having to blog about my grandkids (Yikes! JUST KIDDING!), I really need to get re-involved over here. I have a new post that's halfway done but for now, I'm going to cross post something I just put on my own blog; I've received some lovely comments on it and thought you might enjoy it too. So read on, and I'll "see" you again soon: I promise!

As of late, our family unit is looking a little bit smaller, about twenty-five percent smaller, to be exact. With the older boy being a high school senior who works and has a girlfriend, more and more dinner conversations, outings, and movie-watching evenings include only Jim, the younger boy, and me. 

It's weird.

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Thanks For Nothing, Abercrombie! Wednesday, 07 October 2009 06:45 Written by Melisa with one s

Marketing is part of what I do at the salon where I work. Though I don't have a college degree in the subject, I consider myself to be a little bit savvy about finding our target audience (middle-aged, well-off women) and gearing our advertising to them. The entire idea behind good marketing is to make your service or product irresistable to a certain group of people, right? Think about the commercials that are placed in the middle of children's programming: how many times have your kids declared, "I want that!", just because a 30-second spot about some junky toy that will eventually end up under the bed or at the bottom of the closet was cleverly placed during the broadcast of "Phineas and Ferb"? A little annoying, but marketing departments are just doing their job, right? What happens though, when a marketing department encourages bad behavior? Over the summer, I went to McDonalds with the boys, and was annoyed to read our cups:

"Fries taste better when you sneak out for them."

Really? Hmm. I took the picture with my cell phone and then simmered on it for a while. Then I thought, "Alright, who is REALLY going to take action after reading a McDonalds cup and start sneaking out for fries?" And I let it go. Last week, my friend Debbie posted a picture on her Facebook page that she had received as part of an e-mail ad from Abercrombie (a retail label that is famous for controversial advertising directed at teenagers). I couldn't believe it. (Well, I could, considering the source. But I was completely disgusted.)

"It may look like you're listening in class but appearances can be deceiving. Text away in our softest fleece with the perfect pocket to conceal your latest conversation."

Are you kidding me? As the parent of two teenaged boys in the 21st Century where there is sexting, easy-to-find porn (and other things they don't need to be looking at) online, loosened standards in the Motion Picture Association rating system, and a general blurring of what's acceptable in society, I don't need for Abercrombie to start yet another "fire" that I have to extinguish. I have enough problems trying to raise these two young men to adulthood, relatively unscathed and relatively well-behaved. I realize that many teens (including my own) are going to take certain risks (or try to) as they find their way to adulthood, and many of them think that they are beyond authority, but seriously, for a company to basically tell my kids that they can actively and SNEAKILY engage in texting at school--something that is not only against the rules but wrong for so many other reasons--if they buy these fleece tops, I'm not happy about it, to say the least. It's one thing to advertise to a target audience, but it's quite another to encourage that target audience to break rules. Additionally in this case, the fact that this company is encouraging teens to distract themselves from their education is, to me, unfortunate.

The only other thing I can say is that I'm glad my kids have never cared about labels, so we've never had an Abercrombie issue--or article of clothing--in this house. If I were an Abercrombie customer, this ad would be enough for me to not shop there ever again.

NOTE: I posted this on my own blog, and several of the comments were from friends who agree but say I'm overreacting a bit because teens don't read or react to ads. I think they're right on that; I guess my point is that this kind of advertising does not make me a fan of these companies.

Thoughts? Anyone?

Drug-Free Kids? It's Mostly Up To You. Wednesday, 09 September 2009 00:00 Written by Melisa with one s

I'm reading a book right now--great news for me, considering I don't take much time to read anymore!--which is giving me lots of food for thought.

I was asked by the folks at the National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse at Columbia University to read their new book, and to let my readers know what I think of it. This location is not where I'm reviewing the book; I have a review blog for that. The reason I'm mentioning it here is because to me, a mom who feels like she's doing all she can do to raise drug-free kids, so many of the ideas in this book are simple (No-brainers, even!) and though there are no guarantees, I feel very validated as I read through each chapter. Yay for me.

I'm going to share two of the recommendations with you right now.

One of the ways to reduce the odds that your child will not use drugs, participate in underage drinking, or smoke cigarettes? Eat dinner as a family. Simple concept, right? By eating dinner together as often as possible (and starting from the very beginning, when the kids are wee ones), you are more likely to communicate well. You are more likely to know what's going on in your kids' lives. You are more likely to notice changes in them that would indicate you should pry a little further to see what's going on, like when they begin a new school and they are worried about it, or if they are being bullied. Kids who eat dinner regularly with their family are also more likely to come to the parents with issues that bother them, as well: they wrap their arms around the "two-way street" method of communication, which is a deterrent to potential drug use. 

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Baby, You Can Drive My Car (But Only Until You Get Your Own) Wednesday, 19 August 2009 00:00 Written by Melisa with one s

There are few things a teenager wants more than an automobile of his or her very own. Every family has its own way of dealing with this desire. Some parents purchase a car outright for their teen. Some split the cost. Some don't help at all and the teenager has to either save up the money, or resort to taking the bus.

When my husband was fifteen, he purchased his first car (I can't remember what it was but it was the size of a boat) for about $300 of his own money from a family friend. It didn't matter that he couldn't drive it yet; it was waiting for him when he got his license. (That's how badly he wanted his own wheels!) He had that boat car for about two years--amazing considering the shape it was in--before he had saved up enough money to buy a different car, a spunky, bright yellow 1973 Capri. The year was 1985 and that car was AWESOME, especially after that heap he had before it. He took great care of that Capri and took a couple of years of Auto Mechanics classes in high school so he did all of the maintenance himself. After graduation, he set off for Navy Boot Camp and, once he got stationed at the base in Norfolk, Virginia a couple of months later, he decided he would need a better vehicle, one that would reliably get him back and forth from Virginia to Knoxville, Tennessee to see his totally rockin' girlfriend (me). That's when he traded in the Capri on a brand new Ford EXP, with his Dad agreeing to co-sign on the loan.

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