Bullying Is No Laughing Matter

As a parent of a child who is dealing with being bullied perhaps I am just a little to sensitive.  Today while I was waiting for my children in front of their school, several kids came out of school laughing and joking around, they looked like they were having a great time.  Then I heard one of the kids say (while laughing) "I'm being bullied".  This child's friends responded by grabbing this child and laughing, saying that if said child didn't give them their lunch money then they were going to beat said child up.  There were several comments just like this and lots of laughing going on. My heart broke when I saw them playing this way.  

Unfortunately bullying has become a normal sight at schools today. Children who are bullied go through so many things, some even end up taking their own lives. As a result of being bullied I know that my child has developed a sense of loneliness and feeling of just not being good enough, his stress induced tic has come back, and his grades have dropped. These are all things that we as a family have to deal with everyday, which is not an easy task.

I know that the children on the school yard were only trying to have fun, but I just hope that they never have to deal with being bullied for real.  I would encourage every parent to talk with their child about being bullied and what it means.  I would also stress to parents to talk with their children about what to do it they know someone is being bullied.  Bullying can be stopped if the adults and leaders know that it is going on.

Giving Up High Fructose Corn Syrup

Over the summer I read some information about HFCS (High Fructose Corn Syrup) and decided that we should stop eating anything with this product.  That was harder than I thought it was going to be.  I lasted about a month and then stopped reading labels, mostly because I got too busy and didn't feel like I had the time to spend reading labels at the store and I felt like I wasn't getting the support at home with this change.  This past week my husband read the same information that I had and suggested that we should stop eating the products made with HFCS.  Great Idea!  Now that he is on board with this concept we are putting it into full swing.  This is not going to be an easy change for us but it will be a great change.  

The first step for us is to rid our home of the products that are made with HFCS.  I am not going to throw out these products, however we are going to use up the products that we currently have in the house and then replace them with HFCS Free products.  As a part of this challenge I will not be buying anything at the grocery store unless it is fresh produce and dairy products. The idea behind this is to eat everything that is currently in our pantry and freezers.  This is going to be an interesting challenge.  

I plan to take an inventory of what we have in the house that needs to be used up and come up with some menu ideas for these items.  Check back in a couple of days for my inventory and menu ideas.