Cover-up, Buttercup!

A BIG shout out to Britney Spears and all the other celebrities who continue to be such “positive role models” to our young girls. You are all partly to blame as to why our girls are spiraling out of control. Alexi Halket and her supporters think that showing up to school in crop tops is okay when it’s not. School is a place for young minds to learn. It’s not a place to show off body parts.

If these young girls can’t respect the school dress code, God help them when they enter into the workforce. If they think they can dress any which way they want in the workplace, they’re in for a rude awakening.

Maybe it’s time public schools look into having their students wear uniforms. Catholic schools and private schools have them. It would save students a lot of time in the mornings from having to decide what to wear.

Young ladies, do yourself a favour by covering up. Save the crop tops for your next party.

To avoid further crop top like incidents, do you think public schools should seriously consider having their students wear uniforms?

When you get a chance, please visit my friend Tyrone’s blog. His posts are insightful and very thought provoking. See his blog here.

Thanks for reading and keep smiling :)   

Crowd Funding is getting out of control

On February 19th, Toronto mourned the loss of three year old Elijah Marsh. He was the little boy who wandered from his home at 4AM. He froze to death wearing just a t-shirt, diaper and boots. A heartbroken citizen set up a crowd funding fundraiser to help cover the cost for his funeral. The initial goal was to raise $20,000. Citizens from Toronto and beyond raised $173,000.00.

Solomon Chan proposed to Jennifer Carter last year. They made plans to marry this August. Not too long ago, Solomon’s liver cancer came back. Doctors only gave him a few months to live. A crowd funding fundraiser was set up to move their wedding date from August to April. Fifty-thousand dollars was raised. Solomon and Jennifer married on April 11^th and are now spending what’s left of his life as husband and wife.

Thirty-two year old Toni Morgan is about to live her dream. Just before getting kicked out of high school, her VP told her that she “would never have a University degree”.  With no high school diploma and after spending years bouncing from shelter to shelter, she received her Bachelor of Arts from Ryerson. If that wasn’t enough icing on the cake, she recently got accepted into Harvard University. There was just one problem. The cost for tuition and board is $71,000 USD. Morgan turned to crowd funding and to date has raised $95,127.00.

On Mother’s Day, baby Chloe was born to proud parents Wesley Branch and Ada Guan. The couple was traveling from B.C. to Japan when Ada gave birth to a child she didn’t know she was carrying. Medical bills came up to $2,000.00. Branch originally set up a crowd funding fundraiser for $50,000.00. It was later changed to $5,000.00 after a huge back lash from the public.

I can understand why people would want to give for the first three causes that were mentioned but why is money being raised to cover medical bills?

It’s stories like this one when I think to myself, people are taking advantage of their situations to raise money. I can understand that the couple may not have had $2,000.00 to pay their medical bill but their situation isn’t that serious. They should have turned to family and close friends and left it at that.

People really need to evaluate the seriousness of their situation before turning to crowd funding. If that doesn’t happen, we’ll be seeing thousands of pleas to raise money for the smallest of situations.

In what instances is it okay/not okay to set up a crowd funding fundraiser?

Is crowd funding slowly getting out of control?

When you get a chance, please visit my friend Tyrone’s blog. His posts are insightful and very thought provoking. See his blog here.

Thanks for reading and keep smiling :)   

Where are the neighbourhood kids?

Growing up, my parents had to constantly turn away young boys who came knocking on our door to shovel the snow or rake the leaves.

Every Summer, someone on our street was always selling lemonade.

When I was old enough, I used to babysit a couple of kids on my street.

Our neighbourhood was full of children competing against each other to make an extra buck. 

Today, that’s unheard of.

What happened?

 Is it that parents give their children too much of an allowance? Or maybe children don’t see the need to work because their parents hand them everything on a silver platter. Or it could be that parents hire others to do what they could have their children do for free.

In the nine and a half years that I’ve lived in Ajax, I’ve come across two children who were serious about making some extra money.

The first was a four or five year old girl on my street. As I was coming home one afternoon, I noticed that this little girl had a lemonade stand and a sweet table set up on her parents drive way. I went over and bought some lemonade. I don’t recall what she was saving for or if she was just doing this for fun.

This weekend, a young boy was passing my house with a weed remover looking for work. I hired him to pluck up those annoying dandelions on my front lawn. He worked for about half an hour and walked away with $15.

I am extremely proud of these two children for taking the initiative to earn some pocket money. They are definitely entrepreneurs in the making. Who knows, maybe their peers will soon follow in their footsteps.

Children need to be taught from an early age that they need to work for what they want. I’m so thankful that my parents never gave my siblings and I everything we asked for. They taught us to work for what we wanted and how to save for what we wanted.  

What did you do as a kid to earn some extra money?

Feel free to share this post on your favourite Social Media Networks.

When you get a chance, please visit my friend Tyrone’s blog. His posts are insightful and very thought provoking. See his blog here.

Thanks for reading and keep smiling :)   

Gender Neutral Parenting

Boys play with trucks and girls play with dolls. Boys wear blue and girls wear pink. This is how it’s always been until Gender Neutral Parenting came into the picture.

Gender Neutral Parenting (GNP) is when parents raise their son or daughter in an environment that eliminates traditional gender roles. These children are usually given gender neutral names. Parents encourage their child to play with boys and girls toys. Their child’s room décor is gender neutral. The clothes they wear are gender neutral.

One Toronto couple went as far as not disclosing the sex of their child, Storm,  to family and friends (click here for the May 2011 article and here for the November 2013 article).

Today I read an article in the Toronto Star about how Sweden has come up with a gender netural pronoun for boys and girls - “hen”. This has replaced the male pronoun “han” and the female pronoun “hon”.  

Then there’s this video about a couple who raises their son neither as a boy or girl.

I fear for children that grow up in a gender neutral home and how confused they may become. It's almost as if these parents can't accept the sex of their child. 

When it comes to clothing, I believe that parents should dress their child according to their gender. No one should have to guess the sex of the child. 

Toys are a different story. I don't see anything wrong with boys playing with dolls or girls playing with action figures. 

Instead of parents raising gender neutral children, they should be teaching them about gender equality.

Girls should be raised to believe that even though there's more male Police Officers in society, it's okay for them to pursue that career path. If a boy wants to become a Nurse, parents should encourage him to follow his dreams. 

The last thing our society needs are more children who are confused about their identity. God didn't make a mistake when He created your son or daughter so please raise them accordingly.

What are your thoughts on Gender Neutral Parenting? Is this a parenting style you would consider?

Feel free to share this post on your favourite Social Media Networks.

When you get a chance, please visit my friend Tyrone’s blog. His posts are insightful and very thought provoking. See his blog here.

Thanks for reading and keep smiling :)   

Horrible Ribs at MESH Peri-Peri Grill

I’m not a ribs fan. They’re too messy and I don’t like getting my fingers dirty.

On Sunday, I was actually craving for some ribs. My friend and I decided to head over to MESH Peri-Peri Grill in Mississauga. Ribs were on their menu so we decided to give them a try.

We ordered a take-out order of ribs, a baked potato and a side of fries.

We must have waited a good 45 minutes for our order. Once we received our food, we decided to dine in. We were just that hungry.

When we opened our container, we were shocked to find two slabs of meat that looked nothing like ribs. The baked potato was nothing but sliced potatoes in some sort of sauce. We were too hungry to complain so we started eating.

After two bites of their so called ribs, I was ready to talk to anyone that worked there. The ribs had nothing but fat on it and tasted like rubber.

When I finally got a hold of an employee, I told him that we weren’t pleased with our ribs. They looked nothing like the picture they had displayed on their banner outside of their restaurant.  This was false advertising. It was full of fat and tasted horrible.

He apologized and told us they had no control on how the ribs turned out and asked if we would like another order. My response was that we had already waited 45 minutes for our food and weren’t willing to wait again.

He apologized again and took our information. He told us that someone would call and offer us a free meal the next time we were in the area.

Next time? Ha! I think not.

The funny thing is, the table next to us also ordered ribs. There’s actually looked like the ribs posted on the banner outside of the restaurant.

I wondered if this was done on purpose. Maybe they serve a different cut of ribs for customers that dine in and serve the fatty portions for those that order take-out.

After reading some reviews, MESH Peri-Peri Grill is known for their chicken, not their ribs. 

The next time I have a craving for ribs, I’ll make sure to visit a restaurant that specializes in ribs.

Have you had a bad food/restaurant experience recently?

Feel free to share this post on your favourite Social Media Networks.

When you get a chance, please visit my friend Tyrone’s blog. His posts are insightful and very thought provoking. See his blog here.

Thanks for reading and keep smiling :)  

Mine, Yours and Ours

When you get married, you become one with your spouse. What’s his is hers. What’s hers is his. Does that also include your finances? 

I was all for having just a joint account when I first got married. Everything was going well until I realized I had married a spender.  It seemed like every week he was buying another computer monitor or buying new equipment for our home gym.

The only time it would bother me is when I would ask if I could spend a few dollars on myself. The answer was always “no” because “we” had just purchased that brand new computer monitor or new equipment for our home gym.

Towards the end of our marriage, I got smart. I opened up a personal account. Whatever bills I was responsible for, I made sure I transferred enough money into our joint account and kept the rest for myself to spend on whatever I wanted.

I remember talking to one of my Aunts about the situation. She told me that her and her husband never pooled all of their money together. “He doesn’t need to know about every new dress I buy” is what she said at the end of our conversation.

I agree.

I think every couple should have one joint account for the bills and two separate accounts for personal spending. This will force the spender in the relationship to be mindful of what they’re spending their money on and to teach them some money management skills.

What’s your take on couples that only have a joint account vs. those who have a joint and separate accounts?

Feel free to share this post on your favourite Social Media Networks.

When you get a chance, please visit my friend Tyrone’s blog. His posts are insightful and very thought provoking. See his blog here.

Thanks for reading and keep smiling :)

My Happiness Project: Family & Friends

I’m in month five of my Happiness Project.

My Health & Fitness journey continues. I finally put away P90X until the Winter season. One of my friends gave me a copy of P90X3 for my Birthday. That will be my evening work out for the next few months. 

I survived two months of Boxing Boot Camp. I’m also adding the 30 Day Calf Raise Fitness Challenge to my list this month.

Last month’s resolution was Communication: to talk more and text less. In March, I received 611 text messages and sent 464. My goal was to cut those numbers in half by month end. Well, I did it. I received 231 text messages and sent only 165. I’m going to continue spending more time on the phone with my family and friends this month.

My resolution for the month of May is Family & Friends: to spend more time with the people I love.

Now that Spring has finally arrived, I will be doing a lot more entertaining. I plan on inviting my siblings and several friends and acquaintances for one meal a week. I also plan on visiting at least one person a week as well.

Earlier last month, I mentioned to one of my students Mom that I want to learn how to knit by the end of the year. Last month for my birthday, they surprised me with a bag full of yarn. Next week I’ll be having my first knitting lesson. I’m super excited!!! My first project is going to be a rainbow blanket for my nephew.

What resolutions have you made for this month?

Feel free to share this post on your favourite Social Media Networks.

When you get a chance, please visit my friend Tyrone’s blog. His posts are insightful and very thought provoking. See his blog here.

Thanks for reading and keep smiling :)