Absolute.

We are in a sweet, sweet season with the kids right now.   One of the twins made straight A’s for 5 th six weeks and the other made A-B honor roll for the entire first semester.   All 3 kids have jobs.   All 3 have their licenses. 2 of them have purchased their own cars.   2 of them are in the process of talking to college coaches and hoping to attend college in the fall.   They are coming to the place where they treasure the opportunity for all 5 of us to gather around the dinner table and they value family time.   Both girls are coming to me and Matt with stories and wanting us to be a part of their lives.   They are independently setting their own technology boundaries.   I thought I was going to write a whole blog post about how good they are doing right now, but this blog isn’t supposed to be a highlight reel.   I didn’t write a blog post about all of the hard days that led up to this.   I didn’t write about the drama and tears she...

Four Weeks, Four Lessons, One Truth Last month, Matt (husband) and I had the privilege of serving as foster parents for two incredible kids.   They brought (more than) their fair share of challenges, but I was consistently inspired by their strength, resiliency, adaptability, and willingness to draw the good out of others.   They were hilarious, entertaining, sometimes easygoing, and often times annoying.   They spent lots of extra time at home and out of school due to holidays and the Polar Vortex.   It was a ton of fun and I’ve heard the same question a few times, “What did you learn?”   I learned SO much, but wanted to use this post to share 4 key takeaways and one big truth. #1 Your level of authority over someone will never exceed the level of trust and respect that person has for you.   I saw this demonstrated in very concrete ways with kids during these four weeks.  These two became more and more compliant as we consistently proved to the...