This could get just downright scary............
At some point this evening, one of our kids (we still don't know which one) decided to pick up something hard and whack our tv screen with it. Now if you've seen our living room, you know that we love television. We have a nice LCD HDTV that we got on a Black Friday sale dirt cheap (compared to the original price). It has a 32" widescreen and TONS of input ports in the back for all sorts of stuff to hook up (even a computer can hook up to it because it has one of those ports on it). We also have a dish hooked to it and the smaller version of this tv that is in our bedroom. My 2 year old knows how to work the remote and what buttons to push to watch her favorite channels. Yes, television is a favorite pastime in this house.
Sooooooo................
On of the kids broke the tv tonight. Scott threw a fit over it, I threw a fit over it, and the oldest kids tried to demand that we go out right this second and buy a new one. Yeah, right. I'm not a magician; I can not make money appear out of thin air. So, that means no more tv in the living room. And since they aren't allowed anywhere NEAR the one in our bedroom (its not even 6 months old yet, we'd like to keep it in good shape thank you) this means there is no more television for them until we save up the money to buy a new one.
Now there is the interesting thing. See, we live in an older home (built in the early 1950's) and it needs a lot of work still. We need to replace the water heater at some point in the near future (we've rigged it so that the problem is fixed for now but it has to be dealt with) and that is going to cost us a pretty penny. We also have to replace all the flooring, paint inside and out, and do some window replacements (to name a few repairs). Obviously, replacing a tv is not very high on our priority list as homeowners. The kids are going to hate us for this one....................
We're looking at a year or more without a tv in the living room right now, and quite honestly the thought of this THRILLS me. I don't want a tv out here, it is constantly on and it messes with my ADHD something fierce when I'm trying to do chores and other stuff. In fact, I've been trying to convince Scott to take the tv out of this room period so that we don't have to deal with it droning on and on all the time when the kids are awake. Looks like I got my way tonight, what a way for it to happen though.
And already I noticed a major change in my home. Melissa sat down and was reading a book to Kimmy and Jordan (Jordan fell asleep listening to the story in fact) and Lydia sat down and was looking through her new bible that she got today at vacation bible school. The only noises that weren't Melissa's reading out loud were from Scott and I clicking away on computers, the washer and dryer, and our air conditioning. The phone wasn't ringing, the tv wasn't blasting away, and nobody was fighting (which as you probably already know, the fighting is a pretty common thing here, I'm breaking up fights several times a day) Yep, I think we can do this. I'll allow them an hour a day that they can watch shows on Scott's computer since he has the best screen of any of the 4 that we regularly run, and on Saturday mornings they can pile on our bed to watch cartoons while we try to get a little more sleep.
But it is rather strange to look around my living room and NOT see a tv in here. I now have to move around a few things and get the tv cabinet out of this house (it will go into the garage while we decide what to do about the tv situation once we deal with the house issues that are left). Pretty soon, I am going to have reclaimed my girls and their minds. We are hopefully going to start being more creative and get more into books and playing games. And hey, no tv means more time that they can spend doing their chores...............
Yes, this could get interesting around here for a while as the girls adjust to not having free tv access any more.
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