They are surprised on Thursdays.....

(If you can get through this rant, there are pictures at the bottom. Scroll down if you want, skip the rant altogether! I'm ok with that!!)

This week has been the week from hell. I am failing as a parent. There I said it. I. AM. FAILING. AS. A. PARENT. My children are smart, of the four I still have at home, two are gifted, one has math smarts that I can't even begin to fathom, and the last one has a work ethic that blows my mind!!!! However, they are ALL getting one or more D's. The schools all have a thing called PowerSchool. Which means both the parent and child can check grades at any time. We told the children at the beginning of the school year that Thursdays would be grade checking day. The grades on thursdays determine allowance for the next week and whether or not football games, sleepovers, etc. would be happening for the weekend, and whether or not they have phones for the week.

Pretty straight forward right? Apparently, every thursday grades are a shock to my children!! Why? I don't know? They spend HOURS on the internet at school, however, checking grades and doing homework is not on the menu!! They don't freakin' care!! It's my fault, it's the teachers fault, they forgot! They have ONE chore each and no tv/wii during the week. Yes, they all have a sport they play but, seriously???!!! I am going out of my head worring  about their grades and they are surprised each week???!!! Do they forget they didn't turn in homework or just didn't do it at all? why don't they care? Other parents have children that care!

What am I doing wrong? I lay out very clear guidelines, I make sure they have a place to study, I don't make them work or make them pay for any extracurricular activities (I know parents that do). I am at their activites (as much as I can, I mean there are four of them all doing something!) I go without so they don't have to and yet.......they are surprised on thursdays.

My son is spending his days glaring at me now because he doesn't have his phone and colorguard activities have been suspended. Why? Because the kid has had TEN years of bilingual education and is writer and has a 64% in Spanish Lit. Why? Doesn't know. And I am the bad guy. I get glares and nasty looks. We even told him last week, your grade is going down, you can perform tonight but you have the weekend to show us you want to perform at Tuesdays competition. That means do some studing, do your chores, no attitude. Did he? Nope, watched tv, had to be reminded to do his chore, and when I asked him to do his chore, he freaking ROLLED HIS EYES AT ME!!!! Again, I am the bad guy.

My stomach hurts, my kids hate me, and are going to be flipping burgers for the rest of their lives because their grades suck, and the only two that seem to care is Honey and I.  They are all angry with us now, because grades are so bad (in required for graduation courses - yea! He even tweeted that it is the teachers fault because he missed a test and the teacher wouldn't let him make it up. Here's the thing though, he was told that he could NOT miss that class and he did anyway. Why? We think because his father came to take him to breakfast. Yup, during the week, during school, and when said child was told no, he went anyway. Again, not his fault, right? I am being totally unreasonable, right?) that no one is going to team things, no one has phones, and lucky me they will all be home this weekend!

I don't know what to do. How do I help them? Sorry for the long rant. I am at the end of my rope. I love my children. But right now I don't like them very much.

SO, after all that I thought I would show you all a little project I did. I took this photo of a friend of mine and turned it...

                  

into this, an Avatar poster. A little rough but I am pretty proud of it. Done using CS4.

The original poster.Yeah, I will probably just stick to taking pictures!!! :)