So this weekend I get a message from my wife that one of our wonderful children had been involved in a fight. Now I had imagined that my children would go through life without having to fight, but I know I can’t always protect them from everything. Boys will be boys right? Wrong! It was not my son that was in a fight, but my princess daughter. Yes, my daughter! Now I’m sure you’re like me and you want to hear the story of how this happened.

She was playing with some friends and another kid (a boy) decided to bully a little 2yr old. Well, my daughter wasn’t going to have that. So she steps between them and asks the bully to stop and had to push him to get him to back down. He fell to the ground. She even bent down to ask him if he was okay! It was then that he decided to sucker punch her in the face! I guess he was mad and wasn’t gong to let a girl push him around.

While I would prefer my kids not fight I am proud of the fact that my daughter stood up for those who can’t protect themselves.

It is finished! After 7 months from when it began my little girl Adriana is now officially mine. As we were standing before the judge and I watched him sign the final decree it brought tears to my eyes. It made my heart happy to know that it was official. Even though I know it’s just really paperwork and that no matter what she was and would always be my daughter brought closer for me and my wife to something that started out so tragic almost 3 years ago.

It’s always amazing to see God use anything for His glory. One of the things that I love about this is that as God children adopted in to His family I had the chance to the same thing for an amazing little girl. The other day we asked her if she was ready to be a Parker and she said “I thought I already was” and in our hearts and minds she was.

Thank you for all faithful prayers and support on so many levels. In a case where we know it was all God who made it happen.

Check out a few pics of my little girl over the years.

The other day some friends and I were discussing things we don’t allow are children to say. Now this can be a very interesting conversation because what is ok with some families, is not ok with others. Matter of fact even between some spouses. Now I know I’m guilty of hearing my kid say something inappropriate for there age and I just want to laugh. Then I want to know where they heard it and my wife says “you, you say it all the time”.  Its hard to control what our children hear all the time unless you just lock them in the house (not sure if that’s legal or good for the kids  social skills). Yet what I’ve discoverd is most the things we say or  our kids say that we think are inappropriate are said out of an emotinal reaction. So if instead trying to fight with the wide range of words they’ll come up with (like peanutbutter, which you to be fiddle sticks, which use to be heck) Let’s teach them to control their emotions.

I thought I would ask this question the other day on twitter and Facebook “What are words or phrases that aren’t bad but you don’t want your young kids to say?” Hear is what they said.

kendragolden I tell my boys that they can’t say fart in front of ladies. I don’t crack down on them talking about it with each other.          

Twisty58 “That’s a bunch of crap”

LKnerl I say the word “arse” quite a bit. It’s technically not a swear word in our house, but I don’t want the kiddos saying it.

jeremydbaldwin shoot-boy-howdy. All one word

JoshSurratt sucks, crap, and “I’ll beat your tail” are a few that my 2 year old gas said lately that went down sideways for me

hopealot “I can’t…”

tka821 I can’t…// I hate…// stupid..//

katieniles I don’t let my 3yo class say “dang,” “hate,” or “heck,” or talk about bodily functions or certain body parts unnecessarily.

UniquebyDesign ‘Stupid’ and ‘Hate’ ….

Cher Musico Rome got “what the…” From some cartoon…they didn’t finish the phrase either but that so had to be stopped….

JoeAnna Thompson ‎”That’s freakin’ cool!” , “Freaking A”, and yes even “Darn or Shoot” These aren’t “bad phrases” but still fall under the “Substitution” category and “Intent” column.

Nicole McDaniel Duncan lol, my dad use to say when he was mad “john brown” and then I remember the day mom corrected him and ask him to stop saying it cause it was just as ‘bad’ as cursing (wasnt for sure about that)…but anything you say out of emotion- they will repeat

Amber Meinke Granata shut up. Crap.

Debbie Peterson Bynum How about abbreviations too – like LMAO or LMFAO or WTF

Chad Arnold Freakin…, that sucks, what the?

Share your thoughts, Are there things you don’t like you kids to say?

If you don’t already know, earlier this year God granted me the opportunity to adopt my lovely daughter Adriana. We weren’t sure how we would pay for it, but we knew God never starts anything he doesn’t plan to finish.  So about a week ago I tweeted “Does anyone know of a way we could raise money for an adoption?” I got several great responses that my wife and I had planned to look into. The next day I got a call from a friend asking how much we needed. I told him and he responded, “Give me a couple of weeks and don’t worry about it”. So we didn’t.  Within less than a week, God used my friends to make it happen. They came up with the money!

Words cannot describe the thanks we want to give to our friends who just gave us the money to proceed with the adoption. We just want to say thank you!!!  It means more than you could ever imagine. I want to praise God for what he has done in your lives to make you want to share with us like that.

When I think of my friends it reminds me of this:

“And they devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers. And awe came upon every soul, and many wonders and signs were being done through the apostles. And all who believed were together and had all things in common. And they were selling their possessions and belongings and distributing the proceeds to all, as any had need. And day by day, attending the temple together and breaking bread in their homes, they received their food with glad and generous hearts, praising God and having favor with all the people. And the Lord added to their number day by day those who were being saved”. Acts 2:42-47

I know God will continue to use this amazing group of people for His Glory.

This is one of those videos you watch and you know you just have to share it others.

Like most of us in this world we couldn’t wait till we were grown and on our own. Why?  So people couldn’t tell us what NOT to do. Well today I going to change things up and give you a list of things you should NOT do this week. I know sometimes we get so caught up in what to do we forget what NOT to do.

• Do not take the easy way out – You’ll never learn anything new, nor will you get better this way.
• Do not give up – Even the best of us at times wants to quit but those are the times we need to keep pushing on.
• Do not do what you’ve always done – Even if this has worked for years change it up or you’ll keep  getting the same results and in this ever changing world you’ll soon be left behind.
• Do not stress out – I know with bills, dead lines and everything else going on it’s hard to not do this, but if we give our best in everything we do it makes this easier.
• Do not ignore your family – I know life is hectic. You’ve got work to do around  the house and your family loves you for that but they also just want to spend time with you.
• Do not be cocky – Yeah I know……… your the Lebron James of what you do. Let your work speak for its self – not your words.
• Do not eat out everyday this week – Sure its the easy thing but take a nice healthy lunch with you – your body with thank you.
• Do not be in a pain in the butt – Always treat people with kindness, respect and honor.
• Do not watch 30 hours of TV – read a book, go for a walk, and do something beside being a couch potato.
• Do not ignore what God has called you do to – yes it risky, your not sure what  might happen but that’s why it’s called faith.

What do think are  there somethings that you should NOT be doing, share you thoughts or your own list………….

They say practice makes perfect. Well, that may not always be true, but, it does make you better at whatever it is you are practicing. I tell my kids all the time “get better” and then I say”how do we get better? ” and I say “practice”. So in my home we practice lots of things- reading, swimming, running, writing (I probably need to practice a lot on writing). Whatever we have the ability to do, we want to do the best we can.

I see other people practice stuff all the time – from athletes to lawyers and to doctors. Yet, the one thing I hardly ever see people practicing is on their relationships.  Look around you, listen to conversation, look at the statistics on divorce rates or just look at how many people no longer talk because of something silly. I guess you could say we practice relationships; we practice how to walk away from them.

We can all remember as a kid having someone do something annoying or distracting or hurtful to us. We would go and tell a parent or teacher and they would be say “just ignore them, they’ll stop”.  As a child hearing   “ignore them” over and over again has taught us to do just that. If someone does something we don’t like we just ignore them or just walk away.

The other day my kids got in to a “he pushed me, she pushed me” thing. So I got to the bottom of it and decided they needed to work on their relationship. They need to practice not ignoring each other but communicating with each other and resolving their conflict.   Not just apologizing but spending time together and practicing their relationship so they could get better.

So what started out as my daughter wanting to force her help on my son and then him not wanting it and pushing her out the way, ended up as them doing the following

Adriana   “Xavier do you need some help with that?”

Xavier   “ No thank you, but thanks for asking.”

Adriana “Ok, if you do, just let me know I’ll be glad to help.”

Xavier   “Thanks, I will.”

Let’s us get better at relationship let us practice relationships it’s never to late to start.

Share your thoughts do you practice relationships……………………….

Family Fitness how important is it. As we grow older creating new habits seems harder as each year goes by. We either don’t have time or what ever are excuses might be. One of the things we often neglect is our health. Most of the time this starts when we are kids and we don’t even realize it.

See as kids most of us or active till we out grow the jungle gym or no longer make it to the next level or sports or even find out were not cut our for sports. Yet all this is no reason to neglect ones health. More importantly this is no reason to neglect your families health

As a parent you are responsible for you children health and that more than taking them to the doctor when they’re sick. Starting a plan that helps get your family on the right path to better health. So that as your children grow older they see fitness as a part of life and the importance of it.

I have 2 children they re a year apart and 3 days a week we wake up in the morning and go running by the river. Follow along as we prepare for our firsts 5k as a family. This is a fun way to get your exercise in and it gives your family goals to reach for.

The life that your children grow up with is what they will know as “normal”.  It’s what they will think is normal when they grow up. Have you have ever met someone that does something a little different than you? Maybe they put peanut butter on pancakes or they don’t eat dinner together as a family. Maybe every minute of their life is jam packed with activities. Now whether or not this is good or bad is just your opinion.  Now think about how you live; is that the normal you want for you kids?

Is it normal for you to tell your spouse I love you? Do you guys spend time together or is everyone in his or her own room, communicating through text? Is it normal to be active, read or watch TV all night. What’s normal for you, what’s normal for your family? Are you ok with that being carried out from generation to generation?

This week the Parker family starts training for its first 5k as a family. Now as a personal trainer (my wife says a fitness nut) I know the importance of staying healthy and just talking about it doesn’t make things happen.  So my wife and I picked a date for a 5k and said lets do this.  We will be running 3 times a week in the morning for training. The health and fitness patterns you set now are what you children will think are normal as they grow up.  Running is a great is way to spend time with your family and improve you family health.

What do you and your family to live a healthy life style?