However, her twin brother isn’t teetering on the edge of being a tween. He’s trying to skip right over it and move on in to the teenage years. I blame his older brothers (our teens). He worships the ground the teens walk on and wants to do every single thing they do. (And they, in turn, pick on him because that’s what teens do to younger siblings…until I have to threaten to put them in time out like when they were youngin’s.)

Today I asked my 9-year-old son to hold my camera so I could take off my jacket (because it was hot standing in the ridiculously long line to get signatures from the characters from Bolt). A couple years ago we were in Chicago and I let him take pictures with my old point and shoot. He ended up dropping that camera on the ground. Right on the lens. And it broke. (To be fair his not-yet-a-teen brother was trying to grab the camera out of his hand at the time.) In any event, I was none to pleased. So today I reminded him to be careful and not drop my camera.

He looked at me with a look of disgust and said, “I wouldn’t drop your camera.”

“Umm…remember what happened to my last camera? When we were in Chicago?” I reminded him.

“Mom,” he said with all the attitude he could muster, “I’m NINE now. I’m much older.”

Oh the teenage attitude starts at such an early age nowadays.

Post from: Blisstree

Early Onset Teenage Attitude

But let’s look at this from both sides.

On one hand, girls in middle school strip down in the locker room to change in to gym clothes. And it was a female teacher so they didn’t have to be embarrassed by undressing in front of a man. Maybe there was good evidence that one of these girls stole the money and the girls were mouthy and refused to cooperate. Plus theft cannot be tolerated in school (or anywhere for that matter).

On the other hand, this isn’t prison (or the airport). I think a student (and his/her parent) has a reasonable expectation that they won’t be strip searched in the middle of the school day or by any staff member. Does a teacher even know how to conduct a strip search? Do they give lessons on how to strip search a student during those teacher inservice days? Also, when you undress in the locker room you tend to do it quickly while amongst your peers. You aren’t usually standing around half naked while faculty watches and scrutinizes you. And so what if they were mouthy (although I’m not saying they were since the article doesn’t specify…I’m just purely speculating). They are 12. Mouthy is practically the definition of tween and teen. You don’t deal with mouthy by making them disrobe.

In this case the principal sent a letter of apology to the students and their parents saying he “used bad judgment.” You think? I think that’s quite an understatement. He has since been put on a two week leave.

How would you react if your middle school daughter (or son for that matter) told you they were strip searched at school today?

Post from: Blisstree

Strip Searched At School

And what does every girl need for such an event? A dress, of course! A task that was definitely easier said than done.

My daughter is 8, but she is a small 8 year old – her 5 year old sister is about to pass her. We had a hard time finding a dress that was small enough for her, but not baby-ish. After all, she is going to such a “grown up” event.

We tried on dress after dress. I said “no” to a lot of dresses that were not only inappropriate (too grown up looking) but also too expensive. She said “no” to many of my choices, because they were my choices. Dress after dress was too big, too flowery, too revealing, or just too something.

But then we struck gold. A cute little red, blue and black number with a shiny, silver circle accent and inset. She loved the way it looked “so grown up”. I loved the way it had sleeves, came below the knee, and wasn’t low cut. And we both loved the fact that it fit!

Hurray for little victories and the oh, so perfect dress. Now, we just have to find the black sandals to go with it.

Post from: Blisstree

Mission Accomplished – The Perfect Dress for her First Dance