A Gift from Another Quarterback

Two weeks ago Barbara and I went to the Tampa Florida area to do a series of four presentations put together by Shawn and Colleen Woods, a special young couple with an energetic little son, Cameron. This young couple heard about Parenting with Dignity and began to think that they wanted to interact with parents in their community and at Cameron’s school to build a strong neighborhood in which to raise their son.

Now it just so happens that Shawn was at one time my quarterback on the Waterville, Washington, football team I coached. He called me one day and said, “Hey, coach, I want to invite you to come to Tampa to do some seminars to help us kick off Parenting with Dignity in our neighborhood.”

A Flattering Compliment from a Wonderful Young Family

After a few emotional moments over this compliment from a former student, athlete, and now successful business executive, I agreed. As we planned and then refined our plans for the speaking events, including my giving him a few ideas for fund raising to defray the costs of the trip, I began to again feel like his old coach again. On the football field I would send in a play and Shawn would usually already have called that play or would have audibled with a better one!

Another Audible!

His comment to my fund raising ideas was that he and Colleen had decided they wanted to donate a substantial amount to our Parenting with Dignity Program. Now here is where he really floored me!! You see Shawn is an executive for a business most are familiar with, the Home Shopping Network. Shawn told me his company is a pretty cool place to work because it is a company that is always doing something to “give back to the community!”

A Community Minded Company

One thing that community-minded company, HSN, will do is match any charitable donation that one of their employees makes! By making his family’s donation to PwD, he was putting Home Shopping Network to work for us as well. Just like when I coached him, Shawn had a better idea!

EMPLOYEES Direct the Charitable Giving of a Huge Corporation

What a wonderful policy for a corporation to have. HSN has set up a procedure to encourage and then enhance all their employees’ charitable giving. On top of that they give their employees the power to direct the charitable giving of the corporation itself!

It is both humbling and inspiring to us to receive the support and the go-ahead TO DO MORE OF OUR WORK from the people mentioned over the past few days! Commitment from people like that renews our dedication to changing families, changing communities, changing our country by building a better world for kids. By having people like Shawn and Colleen Woods donating to Parenting with Dignity, we are obligated to do our best! To see ahuge corporation like HSN join in is even more motivating!

Now, if you would like to join us by donating to Parenting with Dignity, we promise we will do our best to make your dollars count in building a better world for kids! Parenting with Dignity is a 501 ( c ) 3 Public Non-Profit so any donation is TAX DEDUCTABLE! Tax time is just around the corner and we can provide you with a tax deductable receipt! We would appreciate having you consider donating any amount. Every bit helps us to do our significant work. To set up a donation please just click on the link below:

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Kidnapped Part 4 (A Necessary Concluding Chapter)

A Final Wake Up Call

Well, let me tell you that I did not intend to write a Part 4 to this series on Kidnapping… but something happened just yesterday, right here in our beautiful and peaceful little community of Kalispell, Montana, that made me know that I needed to do this concluding article.

Here in our beautiful and peaceful community and just about three miles from our home, a young boy, age three, has disappeared!

Amber Alert

According to our local newspaper, the Daily Interlake, “an Amber Alert was issued Thursday morning for a boy who disappeared from a relative’s house in Evergreen (a small subdivision of Kalispell) on Wednesday night. The alert signals that 3-year-old Loic J.M. Rogers is believed to have been abducted.”

If abduction can happen here it can happen anywhere! Like I said in my first Blog on Kidnapping, this family did one of the best things that they could do to protect their son… they live in America in a quiet and normally safe neighborhood. But that was not enough.

According to the article, Undersheriff Pete Wingert said, “The father, son Loic, and a younger sibling had just eaten dinner at a relative’s house on Maple Drive. The father took Loic out to the car and went back inside the house to get the other child. When he came back out, the boy was gone!” Wingert said.

The boy was wearing a red, white and blue coat; blue jeans; a multi-colored beanie hat; a long-sleeved T-shirt and tan leather boots. He is 3 feet tall and has blonde hair and blue eyes.Anyone with information is urged to call the Sheriff’s Office at 758-5610.

All that it took was that innocent brief moment and the boy was gone.

Start Today!

Practice all of the protections that were discussed in the previous three articles on this Blog with your children tonight! Right away!

Messages of Love: Say the Words

Just Say it!

Kids should hear us saying, “I love you” to them! It should be the first thing that they hear every morning, and the last thing that they hear every night. They should hear it in the middle or at the end of arguments, on the phone, and at unexpected times. No matter what, you must say the words, "I love you!" If parents do not say the words, then it is very likely that all other attempts at expressing love will fail. Without the words, our kids just might miss the message completely!

Let me say it again! “I love you,” must be the first thing that our kids hear in the morning and the last thing that they hear before they go to sleep at night and they must hear those words repeatedly all day long! Our kids will not know that we love them just because they live in our homes. If we fail to tell them regularly that we unconditionally love them, they may miss the message when we send it in other very critical ways. While I was growing up, my Dad told me that he loved me in every other way, but... because he did not say the words I had missed the message until I was thirty-one. then he finally said the words.

Get the full Story!

In my book, Parenting with Dignity, and in our video curriculum, I reveal the full story of my father and how he finally said the words, “I love you!” to me. I would recommend that you get my book or the video curriculum to learn the full story (you can get either by Christmas with free postage), because I find that many people shared a similar experience with their parents! However, for the sake of this article, let it suffice to say that he communicated his love for me in every other way that I could name, but, because he did not say the words, I missed the rest of the message!

Do not take that risk with your children! Tell them that you love them today! And every day! In these words! “I love you!”

Two Additional Observations

It is also important to note two additional observations that are of real significance in this event with my dad.

1. It Is Never Too Late!

The first, it is that it is never to late to say “I love you!” My dad waited until I was thirty-six and he was fifty-eight to say those words to me but, when he finally did, it meant the whole world to me. He only lived six more years after that night when he first told me that he loved me, but I never saw that wonderful man ever again that he did not tell me that he loved me. Those were six of the best years of my life and certainly the best of the best years of my relationship with my dad.

2. Build a Relationship with Parents Too!

Next, it would have been a real crime if my amazing and loving father had gone to his grave never having heard the words “thank you” from his son! It is never to late for that either. Many people have told me that after hearing the amazing story about my dad and me that they finally realized what had been missing between them and their parents and hearing that story simply motivated them to build some emotional bridges of their own. If you are one of those people let me encourage you to take the necessary action to build the relationship with a parent. It is an effort well worth the giving.