I DON'T DO TEENAGERS â—½ HOME
I think the early teens are difficult for parents and for grandparents, as well. The kids are growing up, hanging with friends, talking on their phones, interested in lots of activities with others, and very finicky and moody…and yet…they’re still young enough to hang with and enjoy who they are becoming.
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We recently had our daughter’s kids for the evening, and two of the three are just entering the teenage years. I have often wondered if they’re outgrowing time with Ella and Mister (our grandparent names), but at the same time I know that they loves us, and know that we love them. So here it was, Friday night, and their parents were going out on a date…and we got the privilege of hanging with the three of them in our garage.
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We started this routine months back, and I thought I’d share more detail, now that they’re getting older, in case you need a connection point with your young teens.
We gather in the garage around a card table and order pizza, and we talk. We ask them about school, their friends, what’s been happening, and guess what? They open up! They share some frustrations with friends, they talk about their extracurricular activities and how those are going. We are so careful to just listen and encourage, as it’s really not our job to reprimand or scold.
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We also talk about a character of God, and the last one was KIND. God is kind. We read the story of the 10 lepers and how only 1 returned to thank Jesus. We also read the story of the rich and the poor in the New Testament and how giving preference to the rich over the poor is not being kind, at all. We even had the kids act out each of those stories. We drew green spots on two of their hands, and one acted as Jesus and healed them. One ran off, and the other stayed to thank Jesus. One dressed as a poor man and the other donned a fancy ring (from my jewelry) and the third asked the rich one to sit up front, and told the poor guy to go to the back. (The sister enjoyed telling her brother to “get on back!”)
We then just talked about kids at school and if it was hard to be kind when kids are mean, and if kids are mean to them…and two of the kids shared stories of their friends saying unkind words. This gave us an opportunity to listen and tell them we’d pray for them.
We also washed each other’s feet – something they did not want to do- but they got the message of serving with kindness.
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At the end of their stay, we played a game. This one was Double Ditto. And It was such a blast, they wanted to play it over and over again.
Yes, it was Friday night and all of us were tired. But we kept it to a couple hours and no more.
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Yes, at first the kids just wanted to lay around and pick fights and be silly, but we eventually settled into a rhythm of chatting and loving and learning about the kindness of God.
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Yes, our hearts were full (and we hope theirs were, too) as they went home with their parents.
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Yes, we prayed for them, gave thanks for them, and smiled as we drifted off to sleep at some of their funny sayings and interactions with us and each other.
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The point of this story is that teens still need us, from the time they hit 12 and start into the teens years…until the time they leave for college or get married or step out on their own. And if we make it simple and routine, loving and kind, I think they’ll be open and willing to sit and visit and feel the love of God shown to them by their parents, grandparents, aunts and uncles, and friends…