I love the passing of time

During the evening, yesterday, Allison was on-line a lot (before & after skating). She was giggling & laughing out loud quite a bit. Seemed to be having a fun chat with someone. I asked her what she was laughing at a few times & she showed me goofy stuff that she was typing with someone, but I didn’t really pay attention to who it was - just what they were saying.

While we were getting ready to watch Scrubs, after the little kids were asleep, I asked her who it was that she was talking to on-line. She said “My husband”. I said, “Oh, OK. That’s alright, then”.

:D

And, I really meant it. He seems like a nice kid. :shrug

She posts on this message board, and, for some reason, they all got into a ‘lets get married to each other’ thing. I’m not sure if it’s still going strong on the board, but her ‘husband’ regularly posts to her blog & she to his. They’re friends. If they want to call it ‘married’, I don’t really have a problem with it. It’s just some intelligent, quirky kids goofing around.

And, we trust Allison to chat with whoever she wants or go wherever she wants online. We check in with her from time to time. And, the computer is right in the living room (although that never stopped Brandy from figuring out ways to get into trouble on-line — sigh… ).

What we’ve done is to sit with her, when she went on-line, from when she was 6 years old & first started going on-line. We’ve experienced chat, message boards, game rooms, all kinds of websites, *with* her. Talking about how *we* feel about the yucky sites & creepy people. Talking about how *she* feels about them. Working out strategies for dealing with them & keeping safe. Right from the start. As she became more confident, as we became more confident in her ability to make good decisions for herself, we gave her more freedom.

Some would call this ‘helicopter parenting’ or ‘hovering’, I just call it parenting & teaching.

Seems to have worked with her. That’s pretty much our plan for the little ones, too. Already they know that there are some bad things & people on the internet, along with the good things & people. Just like real life. Just have to teach them how to navigate it all.