When I was 17 or 18, I drove my older brother's 1979 Sunbird home one time. That doesn't sound that cool, but he (personally) had crammed a 400 small block in there. It was the kind of car that put out 100 decibels of low-pitched BLUB BLUB BLUB BLUB BLUB when you just idled down the street barely touching the gas. For teenage-me, it was awesome. I was also fascinated by loud motorcycles and fighter jets. Standard stereotypical teenage boy stuff, I guess.
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Can you believe those irresponsible parents? Letting their children walk around the neighborhood unsupervised!? That's a recipe for abduction, that is. Every year in the United States, somewhere between 100 and 200 children are abducted by strangers. That's, on average, about 1 every 3 days or so. So I never let my child out without me watching. You can never be too careful. ...
I decided I'm going to occasionally repost some of my older stuff that I still like quite a lot. First up: Participation trophies. Enjoy! ...
"Dad, how come in most stories, it's a boy that does stuff?" said my daughter last year sometime. "Well, uh, because for a long time… Um, well, you see… hmmm…" I'm not sure what I eventually got out, but I vowed to try to find books where it was a girl who went out and did things. I know there are lots of them out there, but they're not easy to find. So I thought I'd list the ones I have personally vetted and read to my daughter. ...
This is list of rules I try to follow when interacting with kids. These are not peer-reviewed child-raising techniques, just little odds and ends I've read, heard, observed, or thought. Some are undoubtedly pseudo-psychology. Some are probably hippie-talk nonsense. Some of them might be helpful, some useless, and maybe some are actually harmful. Maybe they're all meaningless, I don't know. I'm mostly talking out of my ass here, but I think they could be important, so I'm sharing. ...
I've noticed this ever since our daughter was born. Many times when I try to do a little research on any parenting topic or visit any parenting forum, it's assumed the reader is the mom. This became even more apparent with my recent decisions. In doing (secular) homeschool research, there's a pattern I see many times: It's simply assumed that the stay-at-home parent is the mom. It's assumed that the mom does the homeschooling. It's assumed that the dad doesn't clean, cook, or do laundry, etc. It's assumed that the mom cares and the dad dismisses. It's assumed that the dad doesn't help out with the kids, or if he does, it's in some trivial way or it's some sort of minor aberration to a universal rule. ...
I was a homeschooled child. I am shy, socially awkward, somewhat self-centered and have a very hard time making friends and fitting into groups. These are hallmarks of the homeschooled. Ask anyone, they'll tell you. Sometimes you don't even need to ask: they'll tell you anyway. There's only one problem: I lied. I wasn't homeschooled. I went to private grade school (Catholic) and public high school. ...
Several people I know have recently given birth, so I thought I'd put down some things I have been thinking about for a while. Namely, the topic of advice. As a newish parent myself, I know there is a fine line between "giving helpful and timely advice", and "annoying the crap out of a new parent with useless scaremongering". My usual advice is "do not give or receive parenting advice", but I thought I'd take a minor detour around that for a bit. So now, because I know you care what I think, here is my advice: ...
I'm always trying to walk the line between being completely laissez-faire and being a helicopter parent. I love being laissez-faire and letting kids explore and figure things out by themselves, but I also have a very vivid imagination, and can always visualize what would happen if things went slightly wrong. That visualization usually ends up with a child screaming and a trip to the hospital. I try to remind myself those scenarios are unlikely, and continually repeat to myself "it'll be OK". However, serious childhood injuries do happen, and certain acts and situations do increase their likelihood. So, I came up with a few mental guidelines to keep me focused on the important things: ...
One of the more annoying things about parenting is that if anything about a family's situation is "different" in any way, suddenly that is the "cause" of everything about the children. And by "different", I mean "different than the observer's situation". ...
