In this photo, Kevin (18 yrs., 1997) was a senior in high school and was looking forward to graduation in May.
Kevin is the quiet type who brings strength and stability to our family.
Mom had a hard time letting her little boy grow up.
They all grow to fast (although there have been times that I thought they would never grow up.)

One of those times was when Kevin wrecked a car and a truck,
and the disasters were all in one week. Bad week!!

Accident Number One

It all started when Dad asked Kevin to mow the lawn. The bolt holding the lawnmower blade sheared off. The blade almost hit Kevin's legs. We are very greatful that he can still walk since he will be doing a lot of walking for awhile.

But the lawn still needed to be cut. I tried to talk my husband into a new lawnmower, but he decided we would borrow our daughter's mower. Kevin picked it up with our truck, mowed the lawn, put the mower back in the truck, closed the camper shell window (this is the "oops" part) and drove away. He then hit a bump and the lawnmower went flying through the back window. Technically, that isn't actually crashing the truck, but it cost plenty to fix the window. And of course, we still have no mower.

Accident Number Two

Three days later, while driving my car, he took a turn too fast and hit a wall. It actually did very little damage to the body, but bent the frame and that cost plenty to fix, too.

When he walked into the house, handed me the car key's and said, "We better wake Dad up" I knew we didn't need to make him feel any worse. He needed to be responsible and accountable for the problem. We, adults, are responsible even for our "accidents".

Somehow we managed to keep our sense of humor through all of that. Kevin is the greatest son. The car, the truck, and the lawn mower aren't worth anything compared to that young man and his feeling of self worth. His understanding that mistakes are fixable and he is capable of fixing them will be a more valuable lesson than any punishment we could come up with.

We have been able to fix most of the damage, Kevin wasn't hurt, and hopefully, as he pays for the damage he will learn a valuable lesson.
Turn to Parenting Foundations-Responsibility to see how we handled the situation.