"You is Smart. You is Kind. You is Important."

That is a quote from The Help.  No, this doesn't mean I've finished the book.  I haven't even started it.  But when I read that line at the end of the post from Glennon over at Momastery today, I thought it was a great title for today's blog and this week's resolution:  Make a new friend.  Bring someone new into the fold.  I was in a resolution quandry, but when I read this:  http://momastery.com/blog/2012/08/23/the-talk/ (which brought like 3000 new bloggers to Glennon) and this: http://momastery.com/blog/2012/08/27/outsideinside/  (cut down to below the pool picture for the part to which I am referring), I knew what I needed this week's resolution to be.

These messages to ME came after a weekend of friend reflection.  You see, we're having kid issues in my 'hood and it came to me in bits and pieces and I've been praying on it for a month.  My LRHB had a moment.  Not a proud moment.  But he's a small child still learning to navigate through the world.  Unfortunately, his size deceives his age and he's been raised with two older brothers that hold nothing back.  And after the moment, it sounds like perhaps this was an icing on the cake kinda moment for others that didn't tell me the cake was mixed, baked or cooled and ready for icing.  So I want to be supportive of my friends/neighbors and I want to teach my boy right from wrong.  But when does it stop being about learning and start being about labeling?  When does one incident get blown up so much that no one ever knocks on the door to ask him to play?  When did it happen that discipline morphed into punishment?  When did I stop putting my LRHB FIRST and others second? 

It stops today.  He comes first.  And new rules.  And MORE LOVE.  And more inclusiveness.  And MORE LOVE.  I learned that from Hero Daddy.  MORE LOVE.  FIRST.  Oh gosh, LOVE FIRST THEN CHANGE!  http://momastery.com/blog/2012/08/14/one-bad-word-appearing-twice-sorry/
I am a work in progress.  Work with me.  Work with me. 

MONDAY.