Technology

I am participating in the You Capture technology challenge at: http://ishouldbefoldinglaundry.com/ thanks to technology. You can't live with it, you can't live without it. At least that's how it's been in our house lately. After a very stressful week of falling grades for our children we have decided to wean them off a little technology, and not just them, us too. My son lost his cell phone privileges because he was spending so much time texting and contacting friends on facebook that school was becoming a very low priority in his life. He was on his way to almost 7,000 texts a month! Really. It was constant from the time soccer practice ended until bed. If he could sneak his phone to bed he did. We finally pulled the plug on that a few weeks ago. If you look in the lower right hand corner of this picture you can see his discarded phone that he no longer has any interest in. When we try to call him at practice to check when he needs a ride, it rings where it lays. What good is a phone you can't text on anyway? There were a couple of days of withdrawal. But, he has come back to me, to us. His interactions had turned so abrupt and inconvenient all at once when this heavy texting began. I was blaming it on being in high school now and "the age". But, it wasn't. It was the constant socializing that was going on. We were all just in the way, and annoying. We still are annoying him, that's for sure, but he's back. Our boy is back! This week we realized that having a computer front and center and easy access is too distracting. While a safer option when you want to monitor what your children are doing on line, it is too enticing when they have other things they need to do, like school work. The older kids can now use it for home work only, until late evening where they have an hour to chat with friends, assuming they are doing what they need to do. My husband and I are making a conscious effort to not go on the computer unless necessary when we are all home and the kids are awake. I have to admit that this is not easy. I love to just load my photos and play around with them, when "I should be folding laundry". My husband comes right in from work and marches to the computer to check emails and see what friends are up to on facebook. We are both cutting seriously back on this. I mean it. It is so easy to get sucked in and tune out. Speaking of which, I need to shut this technology down for the night.