Spare the rod....spoil the child....

So something happened today. Recently I moved the boys bedroom to the guest room. Basically switching the rooms around. And by recently I mean, yesterday. Anyways, the boys now have a WAY bigger bedroom that's attached to the sunroom (which is their playroom). Besides their beds I basically only added a toy organizing shelf structure. Well both boys have happily played today either in the sunroom or the bedroom. Which-as a side note....I have enjoyed immensely! LOL Anyways, at one point I heard the bucket of cars being poured onto the carpet! Eh, whatever. They were giggling and happy...no worries. Eventually things seemed a bit TOO quiet...so I ventured to the "Great UnKnown!" hahahahahaha! Anyways, I open their door and find the buckets to the organizing structure all over the place, every content dumped onto the floor and the structure itself? On the floor with BOTH boys on top of it! Seriously?! So the very first thing out of my mouth? "What do you think you're doing?!" Of course Collin scampers off like he was never a part of the situation (Theo and I frequently die of laughter at the fact that Collin is forever stirring things up/initiating things and then just scurrying away like he was never a part of it....it's funny now cause he's barely 1yr....but eventually that's gonna get old! LOL) and Isaiah immediately looks guilty. Here's how the conversation goes.


Hannah: You knew you were doing something you weren't supposed to, didn't you?
Isaiah:*extremely guilty look and slight nod of the head*
Hannah:Isaiah Brent. I am not happy with your decisions. I'm very dissapointed in you.
Isaiah: *lowers his head in sadness*

*We then start to clean up and organize the toys (which I am VERY proud to say, Isaiah at a little over 2.5 can organize toys and sort them and put them in the right buckets-as long as I leave 1 example in each one)*

Isaiah:I'm sorry Momma! I didn't want to make bad decisions. I'm sorry Momma! I don't wanna disappoint you anymore!"


So sweet right? The point of me recording this is because I wanted to record my parenting style. As most of you who read this (as few of you as there is)know I try my HARDEST to parent according to how God says we should. I use the Bible as my guideline. Which brings me to the verse in Proverbs 13:24 (KJV) "He that spareth his rod hateth his son: but he that loveth him chasteneth him betimes." The Bible is VERY clear that you are to spank your child. VERY clear! However, people have different interpretations of how that should be done. My parents philosophy? Spank for every offence....period. Okay, maybe I exaggerate...but my parents were definitely heavy on the spanking. VERY heavy. Being the oldest, I received the full on brunt of "how do we go about disciplining and raising our children?" All oldest children know EXACTLY what I'm talking about! I was spanked WELL into my teens...my youngest siblings last spanking was probably when he was 9! LOL Anyways, my point is....I'm not my parents. I believe that God tells us in the Bible TOOLS to teach and raise our children. I do believe things like the above quoted verse are very clear that you should spank and that it's good for your child. Anyone ever notice that he didn't say "But" afterwards? Or "Certain children shouldn't be spanked because of disabilities etc"? I find it interesting! He gave a blanket rule to raise a child. Period end of story. But I've found through reading the whole Bible over and over that sometimes we as Children of God need a "spanking" so to speak. We have hard trails that feel like we'll never survive. That's what I call the spankings. But have you ever been through life and gone over a slight pump and the whole time you just feel God speaking to your heart: teaching you, loving you, encouraging you. I believe that should be mirrored in raising my children. I was very happy today when I made the conscious decision to not yell at my child, not spank him, not assume things upon him (something that happened to me FREQUENTLY in my childhood....being the oldest of 4 my parents were quick to jump on me and discipline me and not ask me/listen to me etc as to what really happened...but that's another story in itself) and simply speak to my child. And guess what? I feel he learned his lesson FAR more than he would've had I spanked him etc. So it made me happy that a conscious decision I made in my mind right then and there was really the right thing to do! Some may see this as criticizing my parents or being disrespectful to them or someone else's beliefs. That's not why I'm blogging about this. I am blogging about MY experiences and what God has convicted of MY heart. What you choose to do with your children is your own thing. My parents chose to raise my siblings and I a certain way...that was their choice. And as their child, I saw things I didn't agree with and wanted to change when raising my children. So that's my whole point in this blog. Simply to record my dealings/raising/beliefs of my children! :)