Throwback Saturdays: Toni (and Tamar) Braxton

Throwback Saturdays: Toni (and Tamar) Braxton In case you missed it, Braxton Family Values premiered on WE tv Tuesday night, and you really should’ve been watching. The show follows the lives of Grammy Award-winning artist Toni Braxton, her four sisters, Trina, Tamar, Traci, and Towanda, and their mother and illustrates the dynamics of relationships when work, play, and family are involved.

I learned two things watching the show:

1) Baby sister Tamar is a DRAMA QUEEN!!! This child is the epitome of a DIVA!!!! She comes off as so jealous of Toni’s success it’s kind of sad. While she is still waiting on Toni’s level of success, she has had a number of projects of her own. Here’s a video from her 2000 solo album, Tamar.

2) All of the sisters sung back up for Toni Braxton when she was first signed to LaFace Records. I miss the LaFace Records era: Toni Braxton, TLC, Outkast. Great music! You can see the five sisters in Toni’s “Seven Whole Days” video below.

The Post Game Show: Flag on the Play! Misuse of Cookies!

Sex is good. It’s fun. Incredible. Pleasurable. Erotic. Awesome. And mind blowing…when it is done correctly (decent and in order).The problem is too many people follow lustful urges, misuse sex, and think it will never come back to bite them. Tonight’s episode of The Game proved just that: naughty sex can screw up your world.

Malik has been controlled by his lustful desires since season 1, and he’s pretty much gotten away with no consequence…until tonight. We saw it coming. Once we found out it was the owner’s wife he was getting freaky with on the toilet, we knew nothing good could come from their relationship, and tonight proved it. Bel Biv Devoe said “never trust a big butt and a smile,” but I’ve always been taught “if they’ll do it with you, they will do it to you.” If this girl was trifling enough to PUBLICALLY cheat on her husband with one of his employees, what makes you think she won’t do some foul crap like cry rape on you?!?! Now, because Malik got caught up in lust, he’s jeopardizing the first stable relationship he’s ever had. Misued sex will come back to bite you.

I don’t know what the hell got into Melanie tonight, but shawty straight lost it!!! She let a bunch of women that “ain’t living right” convince her to invite another woman into the bed with her husband. UBERFAIL! I’m all for turning tricks to keep my hubby happy, but those tricks DO NOT included inviting someone else into our marriage bed. Some things are sacred, and if you want them to stay sacred, you have to work to keep them sacred. A threesome is giving a man permission to cheat. And if he’s being faithful to you, why would you want to do such? Don’t go offering your man other people’s cookies! He just might like them better than yours!

So ladies and gentleman, let’s be careful how we go about using and accepting the cookies. One screw up can cause you a life time of pain and regret.

The Post Game Show: Kelly + Parenting = Uberfail

All too often, parents opt to use the “do as I say not as I do” or “I’m an adult” method of parenting. Kelly tried this yesterday on The Game, and I think we all noticed that it didn’t work well. It’s easy, and often convenient, to want to live one way yet hold your kids to a different standard. Unfortunately, kids don’t respect that type of parenting.

In Kelly’s fantasy world, it was ok for her to live this ubersexual, fabulous lifestyle, yet berate her 13 year old daughter, Brittany, for during the same. Little Brit-Brat quickly called Momma Kelly on her bull, and Momma Kelly was thoroughly hurt and offended. There’s absolutely no excuse for a child disrespecting his or her parents (Exodus 20:12), but Kelly, like all parents, needed this reality check.

Yes, it is a parent’s roll to set guidelines, rules and expectations for their child. But, it is also a parent’s roll to model the behavior they want their child to exhibit, so their child sees that these are realistic expectations. I can’t expect Cameron, my son, to not have sex if he’s sees a man spending the night at my house. I can’t expect him to be organized if I’m not. And I can’t expect him to respect adults and authority figures if I don’t.

As a parent this calls for me to change some things I do, so I’m not a walking contradiction. For example, I’m not very organized. So when I’m correcting my child’s disorganization, I have to be careful what I say. I can’t contradict what I’m doing, yet I have to focus him on the end goal: being organized. So I spend a lot of time saying “we have got to do better,” “we can’t keep living like this,” “we’ve got to work together to get more organized.” By doing this he knows, I’m struggling with this issue too, but we have to work at this together so that we both can be great.

Jesus had high expectations for his disciples, but he also provided them with a living example that showed that his expectations were attainable. That’s what we are to do as parents. Raise the expectations of your children, but also show them that your expectations are realistic by modeling them in the way you live. Kids want to see that you get it how you live it. They don’t respect hypocrites, so let’s please work on retiring the “I’m grown! I can do what I want” bit.