Jamie Janosz

I was waiting in the church hall to pick up my daughter from her second youth group meeting at Faith Church in Dyer, Indiana. After songs and a lesson on Christian community, the kids had been divided into small groups and were scattered throughout the church building to get better acquainted and to discuss the lesson. This group of six boys were the first to finish "sharing", and I heard them coming before I saw them. They crashed into the main hall, shoving and pushing into one another. They ranged in height from three to five feet, all wearing hoodies marked with Abercrombie or Aeropostale. They carried skateboards and basketballs. Their hair was shaggy - one taller boy sported a white-boy's afro nearly shrouding his pimply face. A short dark haired boy brought up the end of the group. He looked stressed, his worried eyes were darting back and forth. "Can I use your phone?" he asked. I pointed him to the leader who handed him a cell p

Rob Reiner has long been one of my favorite directors. He is known for all sorts of wonderful, sentimental movies, like Sleepless in Seattle , The Princess Bride and Stand By Me . My husband swears that Stand By Me is an accurate portrayal of the friendship of young boys, complete with swearing and blood promises and tree houses. I recently showed The Princess Bride to my daughter, and we both enjoyed the sweet sentiment and hilarious, witty dialogue. Reiner's latest movie, Flipped , held that same sort of nostalgic attraction for me. The setting of the late 50s, early 60s, brought me back to my own childhood and the fears and struggles I had with growing up and relating to boys. Flipped is the story of a young boy and girl who meet when they are in 2nd grade and attend school together through junior high. When they first meet, the girl falls immediately for the young boy – there is something about his eyes, she says with a swoony expression on her face

This year, my daughter will have her first real youth group experience. She is not much of a joiner, neither am I. Perhaps I have encouraged her in this independent direction; we both tend to go it alone. Yet - as a mom and a believer - I know that's probably not wise....hence the youth group. I am still friends with some of the men and women who "youth-grouped" with me. We have grown older, are married, have kids of our own, yet we fondly remember those days of Capture the Flag, guitar playing, four-square, pizza, and prayers. I highly recommend it... Here is an article from an online magazine that I contribute to on the value of our church communities: http://www.catapultmagazine.com/let-s-get-together-8/article/birds-of-a-feather

At a recent school open house, my daughter's teacher informed our group of parents, that this year our kids would be eligible for membership in the national junior honor society. To a group of parents of over-achievers (thus, we are most likely over-achievers ourselves), this caught our attention. She stressed that grades alone would not guarantee our childrens' membership in this society. They would also be required to participate in two in-school and two out-of-school activities in order to qualify. Immediately, our hands shot up. What could they do? How could we make sure our children were deemed worthy by the NJHS? This worried me. My daughter already is stressed by school. She finds the workload and expectations of the school's advanced merit program difficult enough. She is one of those kids who puts unnecessary stress upon herself. As much as we tell her to relax, to not worry, to just do her best, she feels a personal pressure to succeed, to be deemed worthy.