three minus one equals.....two

oh my! the boy's life has gone to hell in a hand basket!

well that's what he thinks....lol

i downloaded a math program so he could review grade nine math....what's worse...i told him no xbox until he spends 1/2 hr on it....yes....i'm the auntie from hell!!!

you should have heard the lament!

'im not doing math! i'm on vacation! this sucks! half an hour a day! man that's too long! my whole day will be shot!'

well ya, when you sleep until 1pm!

it was hard to contain my laughter! the time frame of a 15yr old and a 50 something (ahem) are two completely different time zones. lol

so i compromised. i gave him weekends off.....

but then i got the call....well....the msg.....his mum said he can come home.

go home

:(

so my 'life' with Ant is now my 'summer' with Ant...

he's still doing the math...3/4 of an hour a day now....told him i had to ramp it up because he was leaving, hey, my time is running out!

says he wants to go to school this fall, in stony plain
wants to try and see if he can do it, that's worth something

i sure would like prayer for this boy.

he has quit smoking....weed and cigarettes!

he even told me today that he doesn't even swear when i'm not home
(we have three very sweet lil ole gals staying in our b&b)

oh Lord, what's gonna happen to him when he goes home.....will there be enough to keep him busy to keep him clean? did he spend enough time here to make a change. we aren't a rehab! we're a freaking B&B!

well one thing about a B&B, my door is always open....

immaturity needs boundaries, rebellion needs punishment...

yes again i have let time slip by without doing my due diligence.

i’m blaming summer….

so let’s see what kind of new and great things have we done since my last post…

party in the park went well.
the boy went to the skate park and when i came to pick him up I was surprised to see a multitude of booze cans and older boarders smoking etc. 
but when I scoured the park for Ant he was on the other side skating. J

on sunday some friends of ours took us crabbing up the Indian Arm.
thanks bmans!
Adam was upset he had to go…he wanted to go boarding again (try not to be suspicious aunty!)
but we drug him along with the promise of a new adventure.
and he agreed he was glad he went.

he had us all in stitches with his crazy humor and was very helpful as a deck hand ;)

his second visit with “EARL” went well. which was to be expected…as Earl put it, “I get paid whether you show up or not and whether you behave or not” sheesh….where do they get these guys?

thursday night Cole came for a ’sleepover’ as we had a summer bbq for our life groups here.
unfortunately after telling the lads wht time to shut’er down, they did not respect the 2am curfew and were still going strong at 6:30 am!! lol
drat you Xbox!
after a failed attempt by unka d to send them to bed, angry aunty shut ‘em down!
later I explained to Ant (and Cole) that I was disappointed in his behavior…not because he stayed up all night…but that he did so even though I told him NOT to and he didn’t obey unka d.
he apologized to me and back to the Xbox they went … 

later in the weekend I over heard him apologizing to unka d….sigh….J

on Saturday morning Ant got up at 5:30 am to go to a farm job that Martens got for him.
counting wee chicks into layer cages.
in a very hot barn.
and no amount of coaxing would make him dress any dif than if it was autumn in alberta!!! lol

he did a great job and hopes to get more work.
made himself $60

after his farm shift it was off to the park agin…for him, not me….as we had our second annual Meadow Rose Society hotdog sale to raise money for needy babies in the valley (shameless plug).
he did hang around and help anyway he could before I gave him his leave

later that night he washed and vacuumed my car while unka d and I were out with the Martens.


took him a bit to get out of bed Sunday am… probably due to the early morning work on Saturday, but off to church he went (Cole being away and having to attend the church on the hill probably had him rather uninterested as well)

Pastor S was speaking on sin.
and just how easy it is to knowingly do sinful things even when we are aware of the consequences.
when Ant came home he very publicly tossed his tobacco in the trash!
Wow

Tuesday afternoon saw the expenditure of his hard earned cash….a new skate board…lol

so now we are fairly close to being up to date.

by Cole’s request, I did not send Adam to youth….all his tree homies are in mexico.
so after dinner I let him head out to skate a bit in the neighborhood, 
he went over to the park across the road 
….and came home late…..

i wanna believe his story…but I also want to make sure I know what he’s doing.

we chatted before I went BACK to bed and decided if he has new friends on the hill he had better have a curfew.

unka d hid the remote….LOL

i guess that was his idea of punishment

a boy with a grin....... :)

been awhile since my last post . 

ya, i know, you’ve been waiting with worms in your mouth!

i’m finding that God is really teaching me a lot about relying on Him and His timing in a lot of areas of my life lately…sigh, it’s not fun but i hope to shoot out the other end a better person!

at least more reliant on Him.

i have given up trying to control the future….if Ant decides to stay in the fall I guess it’s up to his mother to make it happen.

if not, it’s up to God to protect him!

anyhow, on to Ant.

thanks to the lovely Michelle V, we managed to get away for a weekend.

not the most relaxing one, fast paced visiting, eating and long hard bike rides in the rain!

i think Ant was somewhat disgruntled that he couldn’t come along.

he just doesn’t get the difference between 15 and 50 (ya, i know, i'm older than that!)

he thinks he should be included in ALL adult goings on!

fortunately he had a good time, even though he got anxious to be ‘home’ before us (thanks Michelle for going out of your way to drive him home early)

monday was a real treat as we had the entire day of nothingness.

the three of us together eating and watching movies...like i needed more food!

and he’s back to his ole self of cracking jokes and sweet talking aunty into spending time on him

we had planned on barbequing steaks on Wed night , but realized that it was Youth night and they were having a tailgate party.

i wasn't sure how he was going to take to going, but he did so without a hitch.

we call it his community hours lol

the lad just walked right into the crowd like he’d been attending for years!

the kid amazes me sometimes!

i saw a little boy, for an instant, when he came home telling us all about his antics of playing capture the flag and getting flowers from the girls and wrestling with Cole (which he assured me was all in fun, in spite of his soiled hat, and Cole was fine….right Michelle?) and his "tree homies" (something to do with playing tag)

(yes Darlene, he actually got one of his beloved hats dirty and was okay! no anger no scenes!)

yesterday he again hung at the skate park while i volunteered.

and again he patiently (on the surface anyhow lol) sat through my questioning as to ‘what kind of kids where there today, did anyone offer you drugs, do they talk about drugs…?’

he told me the one fellow he 'hangs with' there, John, has been clean for two years and that they chat lots

he said the rest of the kids were too young and their mom’s hung there too! lol

i look him in the eyes, swallow  and continue to believe

on the way home we stopped at a hair salon and he buzzed his head….he likes it. LOL

the steaks are still in the fridge and that could have been the cause of the grumpiness when I came home from worship practice last night, but today he is all his own funny selfness again!

this morning we sat on the deck and had a long conversation about a few of his choices in life and why i think some of the experiences he has had, have NOT made him older than his years like he seems to think he is they have just been unfortunate experiences and he is still just a boy

he smiles at me with that boyish grin...he knows i'm right, but he knows i only know the half of it

he is so easy to talk to and so willing to please

he shows respect and that speaks volumes to me

we are heading down to Party in the Park tonight. 

told him if he got bored we would let him go over to the skate park….not sure i’m 100% okay with this idea….will play it by ear.

i can only pray showing trust in him will return honesty to us.

so there we are, all up to date and all up in the air!

only God knows for sure what’s next!