Have to say I was proud of my ten year old daughter. At one point of the evening, one of the moms, who is a good friend of ours, asked me politely to talk to her because she struck her son, who is a couple years younger than she. I went to the basement where all the kids told me that her son would repeatedly run up behind another child, Joey, (my daughter's age), who happens to have Down Syndrome, and tease him and knock him to the floor. Both times my daughter saw this, she walloped him.

Before I could say anything to her, she told me very calmly, "Dad, even if you tell me not to hit him, if he's mean to Joey, I'm going to let him have it." I gave her my approval. Red heads are tough.