The Art of Raising a Fine Young Man

I have three boys with three completely different personality's. Thank God!

So handsome:)

Daymond, my oldest, will be 14 next month. He plays the role of "Alpha Male" among our children. At 13, he is 6'2" and weighs 175 lbs. So, that role comes naturally to him. I recently found out that when he wants something, whether it be a peanut butter and jelly sandwich that his 9 year old brother just spent 10 minutes making himself, or the XBox controller that his 12 year old brother has, he gets it...one way or another.
I am not exaggerating when I say that Daymond eats enough to feed a small family in Africa. He's literally swallowing his last bite of breakfast and asking what I'm cooking for lunch. He say's it takes a lot to "fuel the machine." I say he's a hog!
Then there's Devin. The middle boy and (almost) teenager. Where do I even start?
This one spends, I would say, 80% of his life grounded. This is the same child that received the "citizenship award" every year during elementary school. "He's so sweet." His teachers would

Just look at that "sweet" face!

say. "He's such a wonderful helper." We heard at conferences. "He treats everyone with such respect." They crooned.
Well, Devin's in junior high now. Gone are the days of sweet, respect, and helpfulness. (we don't see these at home any way) There are times that I swear, he lives to torture his other siblings! If it weren't for this extra curricular activity, he would have no reason to live.
Devin has a whole lot of energy. He loves to play sports, ride bikes, dig in the dirt, catch bugs. Pretty much anything that a real boy likes to do. That's where you'll find Devin. I've recently figured out that the more dangerous, the better. I heard him, our 9 year old and their friends from down the street screaming in our back yard. I looked out the kitchen window to check on them and saw Devin doing a flip off of the peek of the garage onto the trampoline. I ran out the back door and screamed, "DEVIN!!!" He slowly walked up to me with a smirk on his face. I said, in a frantic voice, "What are you thinking?" He said, "What? Nobody got hurt! Did you see that? It was Awesome!!!" That's Devin in a nutshell.
Then there's my baby boy, 9 year old Dustin.
He's so sweet and always ready to lend a helping hand. He's my one child that, if he see's that I'm not feeling well, will offer to rub my head. Or if he notices that I'm overwhelmed with housework, he'll ask if there's anything he can do to help me.

My sweet baby boy:)

I'm not saying he's perfect. Far from it. The jury's still out on who spray painted yellow dots on the side of the house with bright yellow spray paint, even though Dustin was caught, red handed, with yellow paint on his finger. He also still deny's, 6 months later, that he texted a dirty word to his older brother from my cell phone. Even though we know that he's the one that had the phone at the time that the text was delivered. But when interrogated by Daymond, he still cries and swears it wasn't him! So who knows, maybe it was the dog!

With all of this bad, comes a whole lot of good.
I was stopped in town Saturday and it was brought to my attention that, while we weren't able to attend Daymond's football game last week, he stopped late in the game while the two teams were tied, knelt down on the field and said a prayer in front of his team mates and all of the other people. That's a pretty bold move for a 13 year old.
Devin may act out at home and torture and torment his siblings, which I hear is completely normal. But he gave up one of the best friends that he had made in a new school because he was making racial comments to some other kids in their class. Devin told him that he wasn't going to be his friend anymore if that's how he was going to treat other people. And that we didn't believe that way because we were christian's. The boy didn't stop. So Devin stuck to his word. An equally bold move for a 12 year old.
I'm proud of my boys. There are times that I think, do they hear anything I say to them? Why do I waste my breath? But I know, at the end of the day, it's getting through. And that makes me one happy mama!